It's time for harvest!

Honey boxes stacked on top of hives at one of our apiary sites.

What's new on the farm:

Today we begin harvesting from the hives!

The bees have had their honey boxes on for a few weeks and they are filling the boxes up with their excess honey.

We had hoped that harvest would start last week. Unfortunately, we had several days of smoke which meant the bees were not foraging much.

The good news is that it has rained for the last two days. This was much welcomed, as it was the first time it had rained since my last newsletter. Thanks to everyone who sent rain wishes our way!

The honey in the boxes was also quite wet, so we had to wait for the bees to finish drying it.

When the honeybees collect the nectar and convert it to honey, the moisture content is very high. Nectar is about 70-80% water, while honey is only about 17-18% water.

If we extract the honey too early, the higher water content will cause the honey to ferment due to the presence of wild yeasts. This is fine for mead, but not for usual honey on toast.

When the honey is drier, there isn't enough moisture for it to ferment. It also means the sugar content is very high, which helps with antibacterial properties.

The bees fan their wings over wet honey to evaporate the moisture. Once the honey is thickened to 17.8% moisture or less, they cover it with beeswax, creating "capped" honey.

We follow the bees’ cues to know when honey is ready to extract, ensuring the best quality possible.

In the Kitchen

We are getting excited to launch our newest flavored honey that I teased in my last couple of newsletters.

This week, the photographer is taking product shots.

I am so happy with the flavor and color of the product — it's very fruity and vibrant!

We are using freeze-dried fruit powder to flavor this honey, which retains more nutrients than dehydrated fruit and provides genuine, intense flavors without adding moisture that could cause fermentation.

We had planned to make our first full-size batch last weekend but had a problem with our freeze-dried ingredient — the box arrived punctured and both bags were cut open!

Fortunately, the supplier quickly shipped a replacement at no charge. We are now waiting for it to arrive so we can finally share our newest creation.

Below is a photo of our damaged powder. Think you can guess the flavor?