Bees make delicious honey from apple nectar.The apple tree can now spread its seedsStored honey in the "super"Click for a larger imageCapped brood and pollen. Click to enlargeEggs, larvae, capped brood (pupae), pollen and nectar.

Nature captured in a jar

Sometimes when I look at the blossom in the springtime, or the lushness of a forest in the early summer, I have a feeling of wanting to be more a part of it, to reach out it, to touch nature.We can't do that, but my bees visit the flowers and bring part of nature back to their hives.Then they transform it into honey, which is nature on your toast, your crumpets by the fire in the winter or however you like to have your honey.

Maybe this is one reason why I keep honeybees here in my city garden. It certainly does keep me in touch with nature; the seasons the temperature, how much rain we've had recently and thus which trees and flowers are providing nectar.

A swarm of bees in the next-door-neighbour's oak tree

A swarm in a neighbour's oak tree.With no combs to protect swarming bees rarely sting people.

Honey being spun out of its comb in a honey extractor

The hard earned harvest being spun out of the combs in a honey extractor.

Honey bees make honey so that they can eat it when it's too cold to forage.

My Apiary

I keep bees in my back garden in Catford, London.It's an excellent hobby through which to escape back to nature after too much time in front of the computer.I harvest and sell honey to a few small shops.

The honey

One of my first memories of honey, as a child, was some honeycomb that a family friend gave to our family.I expect that it was mainly spring blossom honey from plum and apple and cherry and pear and horse chestnut and others.It was delicious.Some time after I'd started to keep bees myself, probably in the mid seventies, the farmers around started to grow oil seed rape (the yellow fields that one sees almost all through the spring and summer now).Rape provides lots and lots of nectar, but unfortunately it has none of the complexity, richness and depth of nectar from blossom and other flowers, and because the nectar is so easy for the bees to gather, they prefer it over other nectar sources with the result that quite a lot of country honey has a lot of rape in it. I was very pleasantly surprised with the honey when I moved my bees to London in 2001.

Buying honey

My honey can be bought from the wonderful You Don't Bring me Flowers near the station in Hither Green The price directly from me at home is £5 for a 225 g jar or £10 for a 454 g jar.

Looking after your honey

Properly ripened honey has a water content of about 17% and can keep for years and years.Sometimes after it has crystallized the water content can become uneven, and the top layer of honey might start to ferment.If that happens, the fermented honey will be softer than the rest.It can be scraped away with a spoon or knife.It won't hurt you as far as I'm aware, it's just a bit alcoholic.Keep the lid on your jar as honey is hygroscopic and will absorb water from the air and thus ferment.

Most natural raw (ie not pasturised and pressure filtered) honies will start to set within a few weeks of being harvested unless the weather is very hot.Further crystallisation often creates streaks in it.The pollen helps the natural sugars to form crystals.If your honey is solid and you prefer liquid honey, simply heat it to about 43°C, though this temperature does vary by a few degrees between honies from different nectar sources.I use a carefully controlled tank of hot water which is never too hot to hold my hand in, but you can easily melt honey in the jar in a good fan assisted oven at about 45°C. If you have honeycomb that's set, you can melt just the honey and leave the comb structure intact, as beeswax melts at about 64°C though I'd only do this with the comb immersed in honey to prevent the comb from collapsing under it's own wieght when the wax is soft.

Contacting me

Please either email me or telephone me on 020 8697 1413 if you'd like to buy anything or ask any questions.

©2004-9 Gregory Boon

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