Hi All/Kathy/Andy Kathy thanks for your mention of the oil droplets in honey. That is interesting as it brings up the effectiveness of honey pasteurization to remove 'bee diseases' and human pathogens. The way I understand it most pasteurization regimes used on honey tend to be in areas where it is either against the law to import honey that has not been pasteurized to protect bees and humans, or within an area to extend shelf life for dodgy water content products. Commercial pasteurization and sterilization procedures for products such as milk have to take into consideration the effect of oils and fats as agents which raise the temperature required to kill a spore of certain bacteria (mainly bacillus species - therefore possibly AFB). Hence in the production of normal pasteurized milk a lot of muck gets through and will survive afterwards. In industrial production of inccoculum in for instance lysine plants it is essential that media be exposed to temperatures of over 140C for ten minutes to remove all spores.That is almost one and a half times boiling point. This is also at very high pressure (600Mpa I remember hearing). If we did that to honey we would have caramel at the end. Does anybody know what the normal pasteurization proccess is on honey? I know that some countries (I think mine is included here) have resorted to gamma irraditiation of honey - a better alternative. Keep well Garth Garth Cambray Camdini Apiaries 15 Park Road Grahamstown Apis mellifera capensis 6139 South Africa Time = Honey If you are not living on the edge you are taking up too much space!!