Walker Bee Honey Est 2023

Sweet Honey
from our hive

Hi I’m Marcus, I’ve lived in Astley, greater Manchester. for the last 12 years and I’ve always had an interest in honeybees and as a busy, married family man of two young children I needed a hobby!

Collecting Swarms

Honeybee swarming is a fascinating natural phenomenon that occurs when a colony of bees divides itself into two or more groups. This process is a crucial part of the honeybee reproductive cycle and plays a vital role in the survival and expansion of their population. Swarming is essentially the way honeybees reproduce and establish new colonies.

Honeybee swarming can be defined as the process in which a queen bee leaves the original colony along with a large group of worker bees. The departing bees form a swarm, which is a temporary cluster of bees hanging together in a dense cluster, usually on a tree branch or any other suitable surface. The swarm remains in this cluster until they find a suitable location to establish a new hive.

We locally collect these wild swarms and rehome them in our apiary free of charge.

Taking one spoonful of honey every day can have numerous benefits to your health. Honey has been used for its nutritional value since ancient times. It has also been found to be beneficial in the treatment of many clinical conditions.

The main nutrients in honey are carbohydrates in the form of glucose and fructose. It also contains small amounts of necessary vitamins, proteins, minerals, and enzymes. The exact composition of the nutrients in honey varies based on the:

  1. Type of flowers that provided nectar
  2. Season
  3. Processing method used
  4. Environmental conditions during harvesting.

The nutritional composition of a 20-gram serving of honey includes:

  • Energy, 58 kilocalories/246 kilojoules
  • Fats, 0 grams
  • Carbohydrates, 15.3 grams
  • fructose, 8.4 grams
  • glucose, 6.9 grams
  • Proteins, 0.08 grams
  • Water, 3.5 grams

Why Do Bees Make Honey?

Honeybees are special in that they overwinter as a colony, unlike wasps and bumblebees. The colony does not hibernate but stays active and clusters together to stay warm. This requires a lot of food, which is stored during the summer. Although a hive only needs 20-30 lb of honey to survive an average winter, the bees can collect much more, if given storage space. This is what the beekeeper wants them to do.

Bees have been producing honey in the same way for over one hundred and fifty million years.

How much honey?

One hive can produce 60 lb (27 kg) or more in a good season, however an average hive would be around 25 lb (11 kg) surplus

How far do they fly?

Bees fly about 55,000 miles to make just one pound of honey, that’s 2.2 times around the world. Romans used honey instead of gold to pay their taxes.

Queen Bees

The queen bee is kept below the upper boxes (called ‘supers’) in the hive by a wire or plastic grid (called a ‘queen excluder’), which the queen is too large to fit through.

Health Benefits

Diabetes management

Studies have shown that honey is beneficial in treating and managing diabetes mellitus. It contains antioxidants that play a significant role in controlling diabetes mellitus. Honey can help lower the level of sugar (plasma glucose) in the blood of individuals with diabetes. Honey also reduces blood lipid and reactive protein content in most people and those living with hyperlipidaemia (excess lipids in the blood).

Promoting heart health

Antioxidants present in honey help improve heart health by reducing the risk of heart failure. They lower the risk of heart failure by reducing the ability of platelets in the blood to clot and preventing low–density lipoproteins (a protein that carries cholesterol in bloodstreams) from oxidizing.

Asthma and cold management

Folk-traditional doctors included honey in medicine to treat cough, fever, and asthma. Honey can help prevent and reduce asthma, common cough, and fever symptoms. Some studies show that honey treatment successfully manages asthma by preventing airway inflammation.

Wound healing

Honey is the oldest wound treatment and healing agent known to humankind. It activates an immune response that fights infection, stimulating white blood cells (which help fight infection and disease) to begin tissue repair. Honey is effective in the treatment of acute and mild wounds and surface and partial burns.

Source of antioxidants

Your body contains free radicals responsible for aging, impairing cell function, and causing heart and blood vessel disorders. Honey and other antioxidant-rich foods can protect you against such and other chronic conditions.

Dark honey usually contains more significant amounts of antioxidants compared to lighter honey. The quantity and quality of oxidizing agents in honey depend on the type of honey and the flower that provides the nectar. A study on healthy adults showed increased plasma–antioxidants in their bodies. Therefore, proving that antioxidants improve the immune defence system of the human body

Honey 1lb jars £9.50