I’m worried about bees. They’re such an important part of our existence – without them to pollinate our crops, we’d all be up a creek without a paddle. And they’re under serious threat – many of the world’s bee colonies are infected with dangerous parasites that are killing honeybees at an alarming rate, possibly also leading to problems like colony collapse disorder. Worse still, these mites are now developing resistance to miticides which have worked in the past. According to Wikipedia, a third of the bees in the US (!!) didn’t survive winter 2009.
Australia is almost the only country left whose bee industry remains unaffected by the ominously named Varroa destructor mites. Most experts agree, however, that it’s just a matter of time before these make it to our shores, especially as they’re now prevalent in neighbouring New Zealand and Papua New Guinea.
Whilst I can’t do anything to stop the parasites, and will continue to fret about the welfare of the world’s bees, I decided today that I needed to put away some Australian honey. I know it’s crazy – we only go through a couple of jars a year – but honey lasts almost forever, and I want to continue eating it in a chemical-free form for as long as possible (which will presumably only be until the Varroa mites make it here).
Fellow Aussies, did you know that we can buy organic honey, from the only remaining strain of pure Ligurian bees in the world, at Aldi? For just $5 a 500g jar? It’s a ridiculous bargain, and since a Sydney Morning Herald article was written about it last year, the price has actually gone down.
I have my ten glass jars of liquid gold stashed away. Even if you’re not as nutty as I am, I hope that the next time you have a spoonful of honey, you’ll spare a thought and a prayer for the plight of the world’s bees. And if you’re living here in Oz, give thanks that we still have access to organic honey at such a reasonable price!
Fig Jam and Lime Cordial 
I am off to Aldi – even though I swore I am only patronising Tasmanian honey
Roz, it was your post that got me thinking today…thank you!
I’m equally concerned about the bees – I love your idea of storing some away. I’ve run into honey crystallizing over time, though (not sure if this happens to unopened jars?)
Sasha, I had a chat to Richard the bee man about this last week – he said the honey will crystallise over time, and expiry dates are related to that. But the honey doesn’t actually go off, and you just need to gently warm crystallised honey and it will soften again. I think it does happen in unopened jars, and some honeys are actually more likely to crystallise than others.
Psst, don’t tell anyone but we have a small hive of bees in our backyard. We don’t bother them and they buzz around the purple basil. Our party happy neighbors tell us that we might have bees in our yard (they keep drowning in their pool) and we just look blankly at them.
Maz, your secret is safe with me.. :)
HI, can I just point out the honey comes from Kangaroo Island, off the coast of mainland South Australia.
Kangaroo Island is the home for the pure Ligurian bees.
There are over 30 full time bee keepers on the Island and they produce (with the bees help) tonnes of honey every year. Cliffords are one of the bigger honey farms and you can buy online. Honey at Aldi might have been heat treated to maintain shelf life. Honey producers like Cliffords don’t like heat treating the honey. Due to this it can crystalise in the jar.
Cheers
From what we’ve been hearing in this country, I thought that colony collapse disorder was a separate problem from the mites. We have a large problem with mites in the UK, but so far have not seen much colony collapse (according to the TV programmes).
Rather than hording honey (if we all did that, there wouldn’t be enough to satisfy demand), the best thing we can all do is to make our gardens more insect friendly – plant flowers which specifically attract bees and other flying insects, and which provide food for them over as long a preiod as possible.
The loss of honey isn’t the biggest problem – at least 1/3 of all food crops, worldwide, are pollinated by bees and other flying insects. If we lose those insects then food production becomes more difficult and more limited in range.
Moo, thanks for the headsup. I’ll check out their website. Is the heating process the difference between raw honey and “regular” honey?
Sue, you’re absolutely right, the honey is the least of the problem, without the bees, many of our agricultural crops wouldn’t be pollinated. The issue for me with the honey is this – while Australia is still mite free, our bees don’t need to be treated with chemicals. That’s going to end eventually, and I’d like some honey put away for when that happens. Also, I’d like to support our organic bee industry, tiny that it is…
PS. We’re growing lavendar, thyme, and oodles of nasturtiums for the bees. Will discuss with Pete what else we can put in…
I’m worried about the bees too! I like the idea of storing honey, but isn’t all the goodness taken out when it’s been heat treated? We do have a couple of local suppliers, which is good for now. Ideally, I would love to keep some bees in the backyard at some point, for pollination and honey….but absolutely not ready to embark on such a plan..yet. :)
Aside from the plants you’ve mentioned, Celia, I’ve read that bees absolutley LOVE borage! It’s an annual and most nurseries stock it in the herb section, or it can be grown from seed. It’s next on my wish list for our fruit area…apparently it goes great around strawberries…
Christine, I’m afraid I don’t know enough about it – I have honey in my peppermint tea, and occasionally cook with it, but we’re not huge consumers (apart from the time we tried to make nougat..sigh..that’s another story altogether.. :)). I’d just like to ensure that the little we do eat is as pure as I can get it.
The Aldi honey has a little cloudy foam on top, if that means anything. I’m sipping some in my tea now as I type. Thanks for the headsup about the borage, we’ve just planted a strawberry tower, so I might see if we can get some to tuck in between the plants. Although I’m loathe to go to the nursery again – it costs a fortune every time we go there! :)
Celia, I was just talking to someone about colony collapse disorder! It’s quite startling isn’t it! I visited this wonderful hotel that has a honey bee farm on their roof. Again, we are in sync! ;)
Jinx, girlfriend. :) Although I fear that more and more people will be talking about CCD in days to come..
The rooftop bee farm sounds amazing!
Talking about fresh organic honey make me really think about honey cake.
I would love my honey to have a slightly lavender smell :)
We walked to the lavender fields at Snowshill the other week, Celia.
http://www.snowshill-lavender.co.uk/cm/snowshill/lavenderfields
and comfortingly there were masses of bees out there.
In fact, at the same time in the morning every day, a very large bee taps on our patio doors, and bounces off into the garden.
We must be growing something pleasing out there, well I hope so.
I must put honey on our shopping list. I ran out ages ago!
Tes, honey cake sounds very appealing! :)
Gilly, that lavender farm is gorgeous – look at those colours! You’re the only person I know who would get a wake-up call from a bee.. :)
Alliums, cardoons, lavenders, purple flowering pollen rich plants are the Bristol bees favourites, though they have been known to visit the orange poppies very early in the morning too. I first became aware of the bee problem following a huge article in the New Yorker a while ago, about how the bees get ‘bussed’ around the fruit growing states of the US and are basically overworked pollinating the vast fruit growing areas there.
Honey found in the Pharoahs tombs was edible apparently, if a little dusty!
May your Aussie bees live long and prosper, bless them all!
I wonder how they overwork them, Jo? Maybe by taking all their honey so they’re forced to make more..
Watch out for that borage, it seeds everywhere!
I do wonder about the heat treatment warning when the honey gets heated up in tea and baked in cakes etc. Unless you’re just eating drizzled on bread it will pretty much always get heated up. Is it heat treated at a very high temperature – and what does that do to it anyway? I shall have to do some research!
I’m actually not overly worried about the health thing – my issue is to have it free of added chemicals, preservatives and the like. I did read that it’s often pasteurized to kill yeast spores and increase its shelf life.
Borage is wonderfully cucumber-y Joanna & Christine.
Those bees know a thing or 2.
Well worth planting, although it grows wild round here in the Cotswolds.
I use it in my frankfurter green sauce recipe.
Bees, honey and borage- all close to my heart!
I just bought some honey at Aldi’s last weekend- although it doesn’t indicate whether it is organic or not (therefor I’m thinking not). The honey I buy from local keepers crystalizes, but when gently heated it is good for use.
Borage is a self seeder, but easily plucked out and the cucumber taste in the leaves and beauty of the flower on tea sandwiches more than makes up for a little extra weeding.
And the poor honey bees. There are still many healthy bees out there, but they are certainly overworked and stressed with all the crops and orchards that need their attention.
Thanks for addressing this subject, Celia.
Well said. I wonder what role those mites will play in evolutionary terms. We probably won’t be here to see it.
Irish honey is in short supply these past few years. It used to be the case that every market would have a honey stall … now unfortunately not the case. They say it’s the wet summers. I might try the Aldi honey though next time I’m there … dark honey ganache ;-)
Gill, Heidi, you’re certainly mounting a case for the borage! The cucumbery thing is most appealing.. :)
Peter, my Pete says the issue is that we’ve become so dependent on a couple of species of bees to pollinate our crops, and as they’ve grown more dominant, they’ve out-competed the native bees. It will be interesting to see if native species now make a comeback.
Gill, I’m impressed that Aldi seems to be everywhere! The organic honey they sell here is Australian-sourced, as it’s most of their stuff, I’ve noticed. It’s a great place to shop, if you can work around the mad trolley-pushers!
a few months ago i got raw manuka honey from new zealand, organic and not too expensive. cooking with it sorta defeats the purpose, which is mainly medicinal. this honey helps the immune system in a variety of conditions, and also skin problems and digestive tract issues. i use it as a supplement for my daughter. one teaspoon twice daily, and if it did anything it helped her appetite. she eats much better now, and she hasn’t had as much as a cold lately. for cooking i have an organic orange blossom honey. i paid the same price as you did, but my jar is 200gr.
ps: you must try payard’s recipe for chocolate nougat. no dissapointment there!
I’m very aware that honey bought at quite reasonable prices may be a thing of the past in times to come. At the moment my dad is getting my 3 litre containers of local honey from his area which is absolutely delicious.
I believe that the wonderful Tasmanian leatherwood honey is also in trouble due to excessive logging in the areas that the bees reside. So its not just the threat of mites, but people.
I can’t grow any food in pots in my courtyard but I do try and have a few potted flowers to encourage even a couple of bees.
Dana, manuka honey is frightfully expensive here – I saw it at the markets for $25/kg! The Aldi honey is quite mild flavoured, which I like – Pete isn’t a big fan of honey, so I can only get the mild ones past him.
Brydie, you’re absolutely right, and the more I read about it, the more I realise how much of the bee problem is of our own (human) doing. This article was a particularly interesting read:
http://www.alternet.org/environment/59426/
A question for the Aussies out there – do any of you keep stingless bees in your backyard? I wonder if our local councils would allow it…
Ah Celia, a friend of mine has two hives of bees in his tiny backyard (he lives not far from you). I am waiting for his bees to swarm (or something) as he has promised me some bees. I have bought my copy of ‘bee keeping for dummies’ and now I just have to read it and get the little hive ready for my bee babies. September apparently. I can’t wait! My kids have already started naming some of the bees to come. I am planning on replacing sugar with honey in most of my cooking as I will apparently get about 30kg of honey each year from my hive. We don’t eat a huge amount of honey in our house either, but I am sure we will. And the neighbours…and everyone we know will also soon start to eat lots more honey! And just the keeping of bees will be a good thing for the environment and for the bees.
Hi Celia, I would love to keep bees but I’m allergic. Last time I was stung on the foot and had to be on crutches for 3 weeks. I told everyone it was a skiing accident!
I just bought some freeze dried honey powder from The SuperBee shop, I thought it might be good for adding to recipes where I don’t want extra moisture/liquid.
SG, that’s very cool – I know where I’ll be getting my honey from now on! :)
Chef, that’s hard. We’re quite allergic too, so I’m a little antsy about keeping stinging bees as well. I’ve never heard of honey powder before!
They have Aldi in Australia……….oh we’re connected!!!!! I love the liquid gold…..bit
I get so angry about this – it’s the huge commercialisation of bees which has led to this mess. Shipping the poor things (I’m talking about the US specifically here) from one end of the country to the other in a horribly aggressive way – it’s outrageous! Small scale bee keeping by those that love them is what will save them – and us. We’ve always tried to grow bee friendly plants and this year we had a top bar bee hive built (which is meant to be much kinder to the bees and enable them to fight off veroa). We have yet to acquire the bees – that will be next year – one step at a time.
Reading the article I linked above made me quite cross as well, Choclette. I’m quite excited about your beehive – hope we’ll get to see photos! :)
Thank you for your story on bees. I so love honey and I am quite upset over what is affecting the bees. I fear that they will be gone before anything can be done to save them. We have parts too in our country where the bees are dying off and it is sad. I do everything I can to keep our visiting bees happy…thanks for sharing your story.
Cindy, I remember reading that a lot of problems with colony collapse first started in Canada. It’s very sad, and quite troubling. I was overjoyed this morning to go outside and find about six bees in the garden – most in the nasturtium jungle, but others in the manure crops which have just started flowering…
We’re not big honey eaters, I really only use it when I make museli bars, but we recently went to Beechworth, not far from Albury, where they have a great honey ‘experience’ with heaps of different varieties.
Jade, thanks for the headsup! I’ll look out for it…