FlowHive Offers Honey-On-Tap – No Smoke, No Suit, Just Happy Bees

Extracting honey has been made exceptionally easy with FlowHive, a device that converts any beehive into a Honey-On-Tap system.

Extracting honey from beehives has never been a pleasant experience. Neither beekeepers nor the bees particularly like the process. Not only do the beekeepers have to undergo the tedious process of donning protective clothing and use smoke to temporarily get rid of bees, but the honey makers also suffer significantly. Apart from smoke inhalation, many bees die in the process of honey extraction, which can destroy parts of the colony as well.

Extracting honey has always been a labor-intensive and time-consuming process, but that will soon change with FlowHive. Essentially a few small modifications to the traditional artificial beehives and you get Honey-On-Tap that constantly extracts copious amounts of the sweet stuff.

Long-time beekeepers Cedar and Stuart Anderson spent more than 10 years developing the system that can make this magic happen. The design mainly involves creating unique frames with open cells that allow the honey to flow down and through pipes for harvest. No more bee suits, no smoke, no disgruntled bees.

A custom tap attached to a specially-developed honeycomb “flow” frame within the hive ensures the bee-formed cells are split slightly open inside the comb, thereby allowing channels to form, through which the honey flows down to a sealed trough and out of the hive straight into collecting jars, explained its creator.

“I could see this invention bringing a lot more amateur bee keepers into this sweet hobby, and saving the professionals a LOT of time and effort. When the honey has finished draining into the collection jars – which takes anywhere from 20 minutes to two hours, depending on the temperature and viscosity of the honey – the tap is turned back to its original position, the bees chew through the wax seals, and once more fill the cells with honey.”

The only modification required to the bee box itself is the cutting and fitting of access doors in the sides of the structure. Traditional honey extraction systems have always left a mess. Not only are the bees “harassed,” but a lot of honey is wasted, and whatever is collected is mixed with insoluble impurities mandating multiple filtration stages to get clear honey, lamented Stuart Anderson.

With FlowHive, fresh, pure, and ready-to-consume honey gets collected in jars placed directly below the taps, making the process completely harmless and humane. Though the makers haven’t confirmed anything, it can be hoped the bees that haven’t been disturbed might churn out more honey than in traditional beehives.

[Image Credit| FlowHive]