Blog Booger Hill Bee Company Blog

Happy New Year!  As with the start of every New Year, Dan and I have a boat load of good resolutions. Most revolve around health.  On our list is walking at least four times a week, sleeping more, drinking less and eating better!  I suspect this might be pretty standard fare for many people.  We however have the added incentive of having our wedding coming up in May this year – and for two old codgers we want to look and feel our very best for that!  So I have high hopes that we will stick to it and follow through.

Then we also have the excitement of our new products – Honey Vinegar being the one that we are most excited about.  It has taken Dan almost a year to perfect the brewing of this special pure unprocessed honey vinegar.  It is a tricky business – but the end result is very good indeed.  What we are calling our “Original” Honey Vinegar is now available in 5oz bottles and it is in steady but limited production.

We will expand our line of this artisan honey vinegar with a few interesting flavor twists this year.  Exploring blueberry, strawberry and some other heavenly flavors.  Our imaginations and taste buds have an exciting year ahead.  I hope you will join us on this adventure.

If you are thinking about your gift list and wondering how to come up with gifts that are unique, healthy, natural and that will be appreciated – all within a budget, we have some ideas.

Consider old fashioned pure beeswax hand rolled candles – all natural, long burning and absolutely beautiful – “comfort candles” is what we call them.  Our rolled candles come in three options:  set of two classic pillars, single large pillar and a set of four stepped pillars.

Old fashioned gifts that warm the heart.

If you are thinking about taking up beekeeping in the New Year we have good news.  You still have time to register for our 2011 – 2012 Beekeeping for beginner’s course.

Our classes for beginner beekeepers are carefully designed to give you the knowledge, skill and experience you will need to start and maintain your own bee colony.  Divided into seven modules and spread across the beekeeping season you will learn how to care for your bees in every season.

At this time we offer classes in two locations please register early as we limit class numbers to 15 persons to ensure personal attention to every student.

Our classes take place at Smith-Gilbert Garden, Kennesaw and The State Botanical Garden of Georgia in Athens.

The first class of the course starts December 2011, so hurry and register now

In nature complex things don’t happen without a purpose. Why did bees evolve producing food with such unique qualities? To answer that, one needs to understand the purpose of honey in a colony of bees. In most temperate parts of the world nectar producing plants flower seasonally. Honey is produced from nectar. Honey is an essential source of carbohydrates in a colony of bees. In those times when no nectar producing plants are flowering (winter here) there must be food for the bee colony. In spring, when the countryside is covered with plants in bloom, honey bees must store enough reserves to get the colony through the following winter. And those reserves must still be consumable many months after they were first stored.

As beekeepers one of our jobs is to take advantage of our bees’ hoarding instincts. Through various means we encourage them to put up more than enough honey for their needs and if we are good stewards we only take that that they won’t need. It can be a fine balance.

We are proud of our Naturally Grown, unprocessed Georgia Wildflower Honey because we know how hard our bees work to produce it – and we deliver it to our customers raw and unprocessed. We were very interest to read an article by Andrew Schneider the November 7^th publication of Food Saftey News  titled “Tests Show Most Store Honey Isn’t Honey – Ultra-filtering Removes Pollen, Hides Honey Origins”.   You might find it interesting to read and share with those who care where their honey comes from.