Maggie, Marisa and Silvana getting ready to work.
Our first honey harvest of the season yielded 320 pounds which is a good start and a very pleasant surprise! We pulled off 9 supers and tested out our new equipment. Fred purchased a Dakota Gunness 200 Decapper and Dadant 60 Frame extractor and we were very pleased with the way they worked.
Our Dakota Gunness Wax Decapper.
Decapper and 60 frame extractor in the background.
The honey is very light and super delicious! I’m not sure when we will be harvesting again but at least now we know how to run the equipment. Enjoy the photos.
Marisa prepares the smoker using hay which we kept going for awhile.
Loading the 12 gauge just in case the Badger shows up.
One of our best hives this year.
Beautiful hive near our garden.
Brushing off the bees gently before we load the super.
Hauling a very heavy, medium sized super to the car.
Checking the super to make certain all the honey bees are gone.
This is a bee escape board which is placed right below the supers we plan on removing 24 hours before we harvest. This allows the bees to travel down but not come back up into the honey super. Most of the bees are out making it much easier.
Transporting honey home to be extracted.
A field of Sweet White clover.
More Sweet White Clover for the bees. Beautiful!
A second 60 frame extractor which is stored outside.
We ran a few frames through the new wax decapper and Fred made some adjustments.
The frame of honey enters the machine.
The frame comes out the opposite side with the wax caps removed. It took a couple of times to set the spinning chains properly.
60 Frames are loaded into the extractor. This starts to spin slower and picks up speed rapidly forcing the honey out. Works really great!
Beautiful honey being extracted. Light and delicious!
Raw, unfiltered honey enters a holding tank.
The honey gate is opened and the raw honey is filtered.
We’re looking forward to a good honey harvest at the end of August or so. There was plenty of rain in the beginning of the year and things are looking good. Now as I prepare this post we are receiving a very much needed rain of more than an inch or two. Talk about feeling blessed. WOW The hives located at our home farm here are thriving on the clover which is taking over 🙂 We are thankful to have some good equipment to make the work easier. Soon we will haul a shipment of honey into Brad’s Market in Minneota. Stay tuned!
CALLENS HONEY FARM 
This is amazing, Dolly.. I thought it was so interesting, especially with the pictures.. Thank you for posting…
Thanks Lamby……glad you like the photos. We learn something new all the time which makes beekeeping very interesting 🙂
Yes, thank you! BTW I really like the girls updo hair do’s.
Love you guys.. you inspire me!