Honey Makers

My honey makers are now at perhaps their busiest season. Nectar is flowing and they are wearing their wings to a frazzle in gathering as much as possible. I like to pull a few honey frames each week throughout the summer and early fall so that I can have a variety of flavours as different flowers come into bloom in their turn. On each harvest day, I spin out and return the honey frames to the respective hives for the bees to lick out and refill. The honey I just extracted is a light coloured, delicately flavoured early variety. I'm guessing it's a nectar blend from the blossoms of raspberry, blackberry, borage, clovers, vetch and wild grape.

A frame filled to this depth yields one litre of liquid honey.

A demure but elegantly charming little vintage with a hint of wild grapes.

Borage flowers are always attractive to honey bees.

Globe thistles are now blooming and abuzz with activity.

Both of my nucleus hives have made very productive queens.