Decanting Honey From The Settling Tank
Once you have extracted and filtered your honey and left it overnight in a settling tank or more simply a bucket with a honey tap you need to decant it into jars. This is quite an easy job to do but when you get to the last few pounds of honey there is always the problem of the surface scum in the bucket mixing with the clear honey going into the jars. Well, here’s a really useful tip to stop this happening and it does work! Cut a length of cling film about the same diameter as your bucket plus an extra 6-8 inches. Starting at the gate side of the bucket lay the cling film on the surface of the honey scum but don’t allow any film to stick to the inside of the bucket yet. If your bucket diameter is greater than the width of the cling film you may have to use 2 lengths of film side by side.
Try to lay it so as to trap as little air as possible and then when done stick the extra 6-8 inches of film to the inside of the bucket. Continue decanting as normal. As the level goes down the film should stay anchored to the side where it has been stuck and the film on the surface should now be pulled across the top, dragging the scum with it. Even if you don’t get it exactly right (like my effort in the right hand photo) you will still get clear honey right to the last jar. And as the saying goes, ‘Practice makes perfect’, so give it a go and let us know how you get on.