Our Honey

Our honey is 100% pure raw honey. There is nothing added to the honey. It is not heated so it retains the pollen, beeswax, vitamins, minerals, enzymes that are lost in regular processing. We collect some of our bees’ honey supply only once or twice a year. The honeycomb is cut from the wooden bars of the hive box. The honey is extracted by breaking the wax comb into smaller pieces and letting the honey drip through a cheesecloth to remove large debris like bits of honeycomb wax, bee parts, etc. It is then poured into jars and is ready for you to enjoy. Our honey brings all the natural occurring goodness from the bees to you.

Where to find our honey

Birdhouse Bees honey is currently available in three sizes:
0.75 lb $8
1 lb $11
2 lb $20

You can find Birdhouse Bees honey at Kingbird Farm, Berkshire, NY or by sending us an email at birdhousebees@protonmail.com

Raw honey or regular / pasteurized honey

Raw honey is honey as it exists in the beehive. It retains the pollen, beeswax, vitamins, minerals, enzymes lost in regular processing. Regular honey is pasteurized, a process that heats honey to a high temperature (120ºF) which changes its consistency and destroys its nutritional value/benefits.

Raw honey looks and tastes different than regular honey. Raw honey appears cloudy and opaque because it retains parts of the natural hive—pollen, beeswax and propolis. You need to use a spoon to get it from the jar and spread it. Regular/pasteurized honey looks clear and smooth and it pours easily from the bottle.

Raw honey tastes sweet with unique flavors depending on the plants and flowers that the bees have visited. Regular honey is also sweet but may contain corn syrup or additives.

How bees make honey

Honey bees work together to decide which flowers are best. They communicate where the flowers are by dancing the waggle dance. They may travel up to 3 miles, looking for flowers. Usually, each bee visits 50-100 flowers per trip.

Once she finds the right flower, the honey bee sucks up nectar droplets from the flower with her tongue. Inside the bee’s honey stomach, enzymes start to break down the complex sugars of the nectar into more simple sugars. When the bee’s nectar sac is full, she returns home and passes the nectar to a young house bee. The house bees pass it from one mouth to another, each doing the enzyme thing. Next, the house bees put the nectar into one of the colony’s hexagonal honey cells. They then turn the nectar into honey by fanning their wings to dry out the nectar. Once the water content of the nectar drops from 70% to about 20%, it has transformed into honey and the house bees will cap the cell with wax.

It takes 300 bees about three weeks to gather enough nectar for about two cups or one pound of honey.