A cold day makes the honey run slowly.
Volunteers gathered at the Franciscan Monastery in northeast Washington Saturday morning to extract the second of two honey harvests this year. The unseasonably cold weather made for slow work, but by the afternoon they packaged about 75 pounds of wildflower honey.
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- Urban gardens. The Garden Guild was formed in 1998 to involve church members in fundraising and grounds projects under the guidance of the friars.
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- Home sweet home. The monastery began its first two hives in 2007 and now keeps a dozen hives. A mature hive can house about 50,000 bees in the height of summer.
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- A sweet treat. The wildflower honey is sweet like a floral bouquet, which volunteer Joseph Bozik says is unique from either store-bought or farmers market honey.
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- Busy bears. Volunteers loaded about 75 pounds of honey from two boxes into honey bear containers.
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- Stations. Volunteers of the Garden Guild convene in the greenhouse under the direction of Bozik (far right) to extract the monastery’s harvested honey.
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- Wax seal. The bees produce wax to seal honey into the comb in preparation for the cold winter months.
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- Waste not. The Garden Guild will clean the wax and make candles for the gift shop.
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- Extraction. The honeycombs are loaded by Joe Arsenault (left) and Felipe Witchger (right) into an extractor, a tall plastic container that spins honey out of the comb.
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- Sticky. Volunteer Felipe Witchger tries to keep his sleeves away from the honey.
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- Old fashioned muscle. Spinning is a manual process, and volunteers like Casey Stanton take turns on the crank.
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- Consolidating. After spinning, the honey is poured through a sieve to catch any comb debris and loaded into containers.
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- Quality inspection station. Volunteer Mark Brzozowski inspects the amber clarity.
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- Fill ’em up. Volunteer Lois Boland uses a funnel to fill 2 ounce honey bears. “I’m suffering from terminal cuteness,” she joked about the miniature bears.
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- Ready to go. The bears are wiped clean and labeled by volunteer Mark Brzozowski before being taken to the monastery gift shop for sale. But not before the volunteers get their pick.
