It is no secret that I love honey. Yesterday, I visited a local bee keeper who I have been buying honey from for years. It was my lucky day as they were processing honey. So sweet.
This is my friend Merv with a giant caldron of melted bees' wax. The melted wax is poured into molds, that harden in blocks.
I dipped my finger in the liquid wax, it was hot.
Merv had 600 colonies of bees this summer, it was a good year for honey.
After the bees fill a comb full of honey, they seal it shut with wax. These wax seals are removed by machine. This is sticky business.
Little bits of wax remain in the combs that are scrapped off manually.
Honey is processed using heat.
When honey is heated, the bees, wax and debris float to the top as honey is heavy.
This is a 45 gallon drum full of yummy honey.
The whole shop smells wonderfully sweet. I bought honey and bees' wax. Like I don't have enough hobbies already, I'm going to make some candles.
Cool photos! I'm jealous, as I have never toured a honey production line before. I'll bet it smelled fabulous in there. Were there any live bees buzzing around?
ReplyDeleteYes there were bees around and it smells wonderful. It was very interesting to watch the honey getting extracted from the hives.
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