I guess this should come under this message string...
 
   With the nice weather we were having, I extracted this weekend and
   found it a joy.  I took three supers off one of my five hives without a sting.
 
  My hives are in our pasture behind the barn.  I take the supers off
  with bees in them and move them about 20 feet to a spot where I set up an old (screened
inlet) squirrel cage blower fan aimed at the stack.  I moved the frames individually to another
super beside the stack, first shaking off most of the bees, then passing each frame in front of
the blower, then blowing (by mouth) any few residual bees off.
 
   It was great!  The "wind" seemed to disorient the bees, and nobody
   was mad!
 
   I took the supers to the picnic table in our back yard, where my
   daughter then opened the combs with a scratching fork, and I spun them in my two frame
extractor on our back steps. Ended up with seven gallons from three supers.
 
   I did start to get fun near the end.  A couple wondering field bees
   discovered us and went home and alerted the forces...  I left the extracted supers out on an
inverted cover for them to recycle the honey and clean up.  Talk about a bunch of happy bees!
("FREE FOOD!!!")
 
   I put the honey in square five gallon plastic "jugs" and took it
   inside.  After letting it settle a bit, I poured it through my high-tech filtration system, (a new
pair of ladies panty hose with one leg inside the other!) into a plastic five gallon bucket with a
honey gate valve on the side at the bottom.  I will bottle directly from there after I let the
bubbles settle a day or two.
 
   It was one of those days that makes it all worth it.  I hope you
   guys feel even half as satisfied this year.
 
Have fun!
 
Gerry Visel
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(815) 226-6620
(815) 394-5438 or -2827 (fax)