Glossary
The process of removing honey-filled supers from the hive, extracting the honey from the comb, and preparing it for bottling. A responsible harvest takes only the surplus beyond what the colony needs to sustain itself through the next nectar dearth.
The first rule of responsible harvesting is simple: the bees eat first. We never take more honey than the colony can spare. Before pulling supers, we assess total stores and project forward: how long until the next nectar flow? How much honey will the colony consume in that interval? Only the surplus above the colony's projected needs comes off the hive.
The benchmark for ripe, harvestable honey is the cap. Bees cap honey cells with a thin layer of fresh beeswax only after they have reduced the moisture content below approximately 18%. We harvest only frames that are at least 80% capped. Any uncapped cells are checked with a refractometer, and if the moisture exceeds 18.6%, those frames go back to the hive for further curing.
Our harvest process starts with removing the honey supers from the hive, typically using a fume board or bee escape to clear the bees from the frames without disruption. The capped frames are brought to our extraction room, where the wax cappings are sliced off each side of the frame using an uncapping knife. The uncapped frames are loaded into a centrifugal extractor, which spins the honey out of the cells by centrifugal force, leaving the drawn comb intact for reuse.
The extracted honey passes through a coarse strainer to remove wax fragments and bee parts, then settles in a holding tank for 24 to 48 hours, allowing air bubbles to rise and any remaining debris to float to the top. We then bottle directly into Muth jars. No heating. No pressure filtering. No blending with honey from other sources. The jar you buy contains honey from our hives and nothing else.
In Florida we can harvest 2 to 4 times per year, depending on nectar flows. Our main harvests follow the spring citrus bloom, the summer saw palmetto bloom, and the fall Brazilian pepper bloom. Each harvest produces honey with a different flavor profile and color.
Done responsibly, no. We take only surplus honey that exceeds the colony's needs. The drawn comb is returned to the hive intact, saving the bees weeks of rebuilding. We use bee escapes or gentle fume boards rather than aggressive methods to clear bees from supers.
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