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Subject:
From:
j h & e mcadam <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Discussion of Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Tue, 30 Sep 1997 21:43:59 +0900
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Garth Cambray asks:
 
>What other funny honeys have memebers of the list come accros?
 
I remember vividly the horror with which I regarded a comb of honey some 6
years ago.  After uncapping, the colour of the honey cells was a lime green.
Thinking wildly of contamination from various sources, I very tentatively
tasted it.  There are times when you have to be your own guinea pig.
Although slightly harsh tasting, it did taste like honey.
 
A call to a more experienced beekeeper to ask "Have you ever collected green
honey" was met with a puzzled negative.
 
While contemplating melting the frames down and burying the lot to avoid
contaminating the extracting equipment I searched through botanical
references and located a description of the honey from Bursaria Spinosa, a
native bush flowering in the vicinity of the apiary.  The honey was
described as green tinged, and sure enough, when extracted it was dark but
with a slight green colour as it flowed.  Once in the jar it was not
noticeably coloured so suggestions to sell it at special prices for St.
Patrick's Day celebrations were doomed to failure.
 
Had the combs been white I may not have noticed but in dark combs the colour
was startling.
 
Another story reported in the newspaper related to a jam factory.
Beekeepers in the area had been puzzled by the red honey being collected and
the culprits were traced to an open window where they had been happily
foraging in the preserving pans as the jam was being processed.  The jam
factory later closed down to open many years later as an arts centre named,
wait for it, The Jam Factory.
 
Betty McAdam
 
HOG BAY APIARY
Penneshaw, Kangaroo Island
j.h. & e. mcadam<[log in to unmask]
http://kigateway.eastend.com.au/hogbay/hogbay1.htm

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