Honey Extraction Evening in SKBA Club
The SKBA has, for many years, a tradition of inviting members of the Association or club to celebrate the harvesting of honey in early August. On Wednesday, August 7th, the Club held the traditional demonstrations of the art of rendering the honey. In short, this includes uncapping the thin wax covering the cells of honey on frames that have recently been taken from hives, spinning the frames in honey extractors and pouring the honey into suitable vessels. Beginners who have attended the SKBA Beginners Course in 2024 are invited to attend and get hands-on experience of the whole process.
This year, the SKBA invited persons with no experience of beekeeping from a selection of local clubs and organisations including Athy Women’s Shed, Athy Men’s Shed and Athy Tidy Towns. Fifteen of these non-beekeepers attended along with fifteen members of the SKBA. Everyone present got stuck into the sometimes sticky business of extracting honey. Louis Bolger and Loretta Neary gave demonstrations and then let the novices loose at the frames and the chrome extractors or spinners. Each guest was given a pot of honey as a complimentary take-away.
One member volunteered three supers of her honey (33 frames) for the demonstrations and another brought a single super containing twelve frames. There were two extractors used that evening, one large extractor and one small, domestic extractor which could spin just three frames at one time.
The SKBA has, in 2024, introduced environmental themes to many of its meetings including a Hedgerows Ireland guest who spoke about the value of our hedgerows given that we have so little deciduous woodland in Ireland (June). The fragility of our hedgerows in the face of imported saplings that carry infections was covered. Another guest gave a talk on the possible threat from an invasion of Asian hornets (May). Of course, the ongoing importation of non-native honey bees is a constant theme at our meetings.
