Honey

Bruce, a guy who works for our barn builder, and Kris tackled the bee issue today. For the last week I've been explaining honey dripping from my ceiling to various babysitters and houseguests. (You don't have five bowls of honey in your living room? It's all the rage!)

But today was the day! Instead of cutting into the wall, like we thought we were going to have to do, Kris suggested we try from the outside. They got on the roof and pulled out the arch above the window where we initially saw the bees.


Bee free arch


Bee full arch

What did they find? Honeycombs - lots of them. Saturated with honey. Apparently it was going to be dripping for a long, long time. They threw them off the roof onto the ground and hosed off everything. No bees, though, which made the job easier.







I'm going to monitor the dripping to see if any more honey comes or if that was the sole source.

Many people I've told about this have never heard of having bees in your walls. But if you look for it on the internet you'll see it's really common.

Yes, living in an old farmhouse has its downsides. Not enough outlets. Having to seal it for bats. Living too close to the road. Random liquids coming from your ceiling. But when Bruce commented on how beautiful the old woodwork is, it makes me happy about the upsides. Plus, we really like living where we can see everything that goes on between our barns.

And did I mention we have free honey? Lots and lots of honey? Free range, organic, from ancient (dead) bees, AND filtered through 130-year old walls! Spun like that, it'd be perfect for selling at a farmers market. I can't wait to see what money-making material this house will produce next. Have you seen how much bat guano is going for?

Sweet

“Look,” Cole said, first thing this morning. “Look at this naughty thing someone did. I didn’t do it.” He pointed at two small pools of liquid on our wooden windowsill.

Puzzled, I got a dishtowel to wipe them up. They were sticky. I looked up and saw the window top was dripping. Sap? I looked harder. The ceiling was also dripping. Then I knew what it was – honey.

We’ve been hosting a bee colony in a tree in our yard for the last couple of years. I’ve really enjoyed when they’ve swarmed. Here they are two years ago, hanging out before they found a place for their new hive:



This past year I didn’t see a swarm, but I did see some had taken up residence in our house wall. I didn’t do anything about it for a few days until my baby’s room got bees in it. Then Kris climbed out on the roof and sealed the hole they were going into. I didn’t feel good about it, but we never saw any more bees.

Fast forward to now - I have four bowls collecting the honey. I called a beekeeper. He said even if the hive is inactive, I need to have it removed because the honey’s going to attract other insects, like ants. That means we’ll have to cut open the wall, have them take the honeycomb out, seal it, and plaster or drywall the wall and ceiling back together.

Kris said that it’s just what you deal with when you live in an old house.

After this discovery, we went to the grocery store. On the end of an aisle was a display of honey bears. Ty said, "We don't get our honey at the store. We get it from our ceiling!"

When we got home, they raced to the bowls to see how much we'd collected. “This one has so much in it!” Cole said. Ty said, “This is so cool! I love this!”

Living on a farm and getting meat from our own cattle, growing fresh fruits and vegetables in our garden . . . that’s one thing. Harvesting honey from our walls is taking this to a ridiculous level. Aside from that - biscuits with honey for everyone!