As discussed previously, there are times when we beekeepers give our bees sugar as a supplement to their own honey stores. During times of increased brood (baby bee) production for example, and during those long, cold winter months, when bees stay sensibly inside and snack happily on the honey they spent the summer making and storing (boosted by these sugar supplements that we helpful beekeepers provide – just to be sure). I’d heard rumours about the Tesco ‘sugar list’ and thus tootled along to the Customer Services desk of my local branch, secretly expecting the staff there to have no idea what I was talking about …
‘Ah yes’ the smiling Customer Services assistant replied: ‘You need to have your details added to the list, and then just wait – we’ll phone you; there’s a waiting list; you’ll be number five ….’.
A mere three days later I discovered a voicemail: ‘Hello, it’s Tesco’s here; we have some sugar for you … ‘. Now we all love a bargain – even better if it’s free – and as a beekeeper (with three hives now on the go, and winter fast approaching) the repeat cost of sugar soon mounts up. So to receive a large bag containing 12kg or so of perfectly usable (for bees) sugar was extremely welcome. Various split or broken 1kg and 2kg bags, unsaleable and unsuitable for human consumption, but just perfect for dissolving with water to make bee syrup and (as I’ll discuss in a future post) bee ‘candy’. Three weeks later, again a further 11kg or so. 
In such a short space of time – and with several others between me in receipt of the same – there is evidently a LOT of sugar getting spilled or simply becoming unsalable due to broken packaging. So top marks to Tesco for putting this scheme into action in collaboration with Bee Improvement for Cornwall (just a shame it is not – yet? – nationwide, rolled out to begin with just in parts of the Southwest). A further fortnight on – and another lot; this time roughly 10kg of loose sugar in an extremely useful lidded bucket – bonus: food-grade plastic buckets again cost money, so to be given one for free … well, it just gets better and better! 
This lot, I discovered, must have been swept up from (I’m guessing) the bakery floor, for I found it to be riddled with flakes of (I think) pastry (or was it nuts??) … Not that this mattered, for it was no great effort to shake the whole lot through a sieve, filtering out the detritus to be left with a fine mound of perfectly usable (for bee purposes) sugar – ideal for transforming into bee syrup, which I’ve been regularly making to feed to my bees 
since around the start of September. A simple solution of sugar dissolved in hot water, allowed to cool and then stored in large plastic bottles. Easy to transport and ideal for pouring to fill the purpose-designed feeder that goes into the top of the hive, beneath the roof, where the bees very quickly get stuck in – enjoying the easily-assimilated carbohydrate as a much needed energy boost at this busy time, preparing to hunker down for winter. 
I’ve even experimented by adding dried herbs to infuse the syrup for medicinal effect – a little ‘insider tip’ from an experienced beekeeper friend, adding variable combinations of lavender, sage, thyme and rosemary – all of which I grow in my garden and store dried for kitchen use.
It’s really important – in fact it’s vital – to ensure that the bees have enough food stores to see them through winter. This additional supply of immediately-assimilated carbs in the form of sugar is ideal for fuelling hard-working bees as they go about their busy work, and is given usually only at crucial times of the year, supporting the bees whilst allowing those precious honey stores to remain in the comb for for winter use. 
It’s essential however, that we supplement in this way only when we have no forthcoming plans to take off honey, and also not when there is sufficient forage (nectar-rich flowers in bloom), because although this additional sugar is intended for immediate consumption (like a person snacking on a high-energy bar before a run) it is not unheard of for bees to store these sugar supplies in the comb, just as they do with nectar (collected from flowers) – meaning the ‘honey’ we take off could in fact be white sugar, processed by the bees in the same way. Not quite the high-quality natural product that we (or they!) are aiming for!
Is honey suitable for vegans?
But at some point in our deepest history, people discovered that honey is not only delicious and nutritious as a valuable source of natural sweetness, but that it also has medicinal benefits; soothing sore throats and healing wounds in addition to tasting great – and is thus worth the trouble entailed in obtaining it. Honey is referenced in the Bible as a symbol of prosperity and health, and in the Quran as ‘a healing for humankind’. Classical Greece upheld the honeybee as a symbol of the Goddess Artemis, whilst the Ancient Egyptians believed honey to be the tears of their sun god, Ra; placing jars of honey in the burial tombs with other offerings to support the departed through their journey into the afterlife – its preservative qualities being such that honey discovered during excavations of the Great Pyramids was found to be still edible, 3,000 years on. 
Yet Humanity’s love for honey goes back long before this, as evidenced in the ‘Man of Bicorp’ cave painting on the walls of The Cueves de la Arana (‘Spider Caves’) in Valencia, Spain, depicting honey being harvested around 8,000 years ago: not from a ‘hive’ as we know it now: people didn’t ‘keep’ bees back then but instead risked their lives for a rare taste of the sweet stuff, shimmying up trees or balancing against the cliff face on rickety rope ladders, to access the honey stored by wild colonies living high in hollow tree trunks or hard to reach caves. 
Wild honey harvesting continues to this day in some parts of the world, and remained the only option prior to the medieval adoption of the straw ‘Skep’ as the preferred method right through to the late 18th century, when the modern box hive began to take form. So, humans eating honey – and ‘keeping’ bees – is nothing new. But yes, honey is an animal product – and so no, technically, honey is not vegan. 
But as with many aspects of human belief and behaviour, there are many shifting shades of grey to vegan rhetoric. Many vegans I know will use no animal products at all, including honey and all related products, on the principle of not wanting to benefit from the exploitation of other living creatures. Others I know will use certain products if the animals involved are neither harmed nor exploited – such as eggs from garden-kept chickens that will not be killed for meat, and honey produced by small-scale hobby beekeepers (such as myself). I totally ‘get’ this, for I too consider the provenance of products and choose to not eat honey from large-scale producers; buying only from reputable small local beekeepers – and now, even better, endeavouring to produce my own. So yes, I understand the principles. 
I am however shocked by the array of misinformation and blatant propaganda circulating around the vegan community with regard to honey; what it is and how it’s produced; much of it promulgated by passionately motivated yet ill-informed enthusiasts, who very clearly have never had a conversation with an actual beekeeper – never mind taken a look inside an actual hive. I here address some of these misconceptions, in what’s turned out to be a rather long post. Bear with me, as I explore some complicated issues – ultimately leaving you to make up your own mind.
Likewise, the medieval monks housing wild-caught swarms in their new-fangled straw skeps had just the one option when it came to harvesting; splitting open the skep to break up the comb to retrieve the honey (filtering out the bits of bees, larva and wax through a fine fabric sieve) before starting all over again with a new swarm in a new skep. The development of the modern box hive changed all this, with the deliberate design of a two tier system, in which the queen and colony live safely in the lower chamber, called the ‘brood box’, whilst the honey is harvested only from the level above this, called the ‘super’. 
It is a relatively easy process to lift off the supers to remove the honey without damaging or killing any bees along the way. As a small-scale hobby beekeeper, the last thing I want to do is harm my bees. A brand new colony of honey bees from a reputable breeder costs on average between £150-£200. Or you can raise your own, with time and skill. As beekeepers we spend all year nurturing and tending our bees – expending vast amounts of time, money, and effort in keeping them alive. It would be utter madness to kill them during the all-to-brief summer honey harvest – only to then have to start all over again; buying more bees! It is however a miserable fact of large-scale honey production that industrial beekeepers do not share the same regard for their bees, and may indeed find it more cost-effective to destroy the bees during or after summer honey harvest and buy more the following spring – rather than worry about (and spend time and money on) keeping them alive over the winter months. For a small-scale beekeeper, however, the exact opposite is true; we strive to support our bees to survive, and take care not to harm them.
A honeybee colony comprises three types of bee; female Queen, female workers, and male drones. The queen bee is the central figure in the colony. While there are many tens of thousands of workers and a much smaller number of male drones, there is only one Queen, and her sole purpose in life is to lay eggs – up to 2,000 per day! No queen = no bees (which of course means no honey). The queen bee’s highly specialised anatomy means she is unable to forage for her own food, or perform any of the many basic tasks of survival. She is totally dependent on her worker offspring – as they in turn are dependant on her. lf, however, she ‘fails’ in her egg-laying duties (through ill health, poor genetics or simply old age) then the colony will waste no time in raising a replacement, and they will then kill the old queen (their own mother) – making way for the new one to take over. 
Either that or they will swarm. This means that the colony will split; first they will go through that same process, raising a new queen; half will then leave with the old queen to set up home elsewhere, while the other half remain with the new queen, and carry on as they were. This leaves both halves of the split temporarily weakened and vulnerable – which can be bad news for a beekeeper, as the remaining colony may then collapse, or take time to recover from the swarming process – time that could have been better spent thriving and producing honey. But here’s the thing; if the queen cannot fly, then the colony will not swarm. That is why beekeepers clip (not rip!) the queens wings. Not to ‘keep her prisoner’ but to ensure the colony stays strong. On a personal note, I do not clip my Queen bee’s wings. In fact I don’t know any beekeepers who do. It is mainly the larger scale industrialised honey producers who do this.
Only a few ‘lucky’ drones actually ever get to ‘do the deed’ – a brief encounter that leaves their genitals ripped from their body and embedded temprarily inside the queen – shortly after which, he dies. Yup: nature is brutal. The mated queen then returns to the hive, and settles down to the important work of laying eggs, day in, day out – for her entire life. A queen may have mated with several drones on that one occasion. Those drones may be infected with any of the many diseases currently contributing to bee decline; they may be carrying virus or bacterial infection (which then gets passed onto the colony, who then spread it to other colonies) or be genetically prone to certain health problems and behavioural tendencies. For this reason some beekeepers – particularly those working on a larger scale – prefer to buy in queens that have been artificially inseminated by drones bred specifically to be good tempered and disease-free – as opposed to allowing their queens to fly off and mate randomly with bees of unknown genetic profile and potential health risk. In the wild a colony will periodically raise a new queen to replace the old, in an attempt to eradicate disease and other problems, or when the Queen becomes too old to continue laying. Beekeepers simply replicate this natural behaviour, utilising the wonders of modern science. But not all beekeepers. As a small-scale hobbyist, I allow my colonies to raise their own queens – as and when they decide they need – and allow these queens to do their natural thing, flying off to mate where, and with whom, they choose. This of course brings it’s own complications; the queen may not return – or she may return un-mated and unable to lay the essential fertilised eggs; thus the colony may die (unless they are quick to raise another new queen who then successfully mates). Or she may return, carrying disease infection. For this reason, as responsible beekeepers we regularly inspect the hive and colony within, looking for signs of disease and other issues – for which we then take the necessary action, supporting the bees to overcome the problem.
I have to say without doubt this is total rubbish; a propagandist fantasy postulated on a glaring lack of any real knowledge or experience of actual beekeeping. The reality of the bee smoker is that, again, all we are doing is replicating the bees own natural behaviour. In the wild, bees have a natural survival instinct against fire. Alerted by the smell of smoke, a colony of bees will prepare to leave their home, and instinctively they ‘pack up’ the one thing they need to survive – food. Gorging on their honey stores until their honey stomachs are full, the sudden rush of sugar makes them peaceful and drowsy. As beekeepers we utilise this natural behaviour, calming the bees with a few gently puffs of smoke, in preparation for opening the hive – making the whole experience more enjoyable for all involved – also lessening the risk of being stung. The bees are not harmed, and the beekeeper is protected: win-win.
If, however, you were a honey bee, you would have two stomachs. Yes, that’s right, and a fairly major point that these vegan propaganda bloggers somehow ‘forget’ to mention. Honey bees have two stomachs. One is the ‘true’ stomach; part of their digestive system. The other is a purpose-specific and much larger ‘honey stomach’. Not a part of the digestive system, but a separate organ entirely, serving as shopping bag, mixing bowl, cooking pot and storage container all in one, where nectar (a sweet sticky liquid collected from flowers) is stored and processed into honey before being packed for storage in the hexagonal comb cells – from where it can later be retrieved as needed. Yes, it is enzymes in the honey stomach that transform the nectar into honey. And yes, the process involves passing the nectar/honey from bee to bee, each taking a turn in the work – but hey, this is bees, not humans. And not ‘vomit’.
Bees need two main foods to survive, and both are collected from flowers; protein (in the form of pollen) and carbohydrate (in the form of sugar). Honey is 82% sugar, but it also contains trace vitamins and minerals and mystery substances that science is unable to identify or replicate. It really is magical stuff, and as a responsible beekeeper putting the welfare of my bees before my own sweet tooth, I personally choose to leave sufficient honey on the hive for the bees, taking only the surplus – if there is a surplus – for human use. But of course, not everyone does it this way, and again it is commercial beekeepers who are most guilty of ‘stealing’ the entire honey harvest from bees that they may then destroy – or, if they do keep them going overwinter, feed on sugar as the cheaper alternative. The beekeeping community is strongly divided over whether this does – or does not – harm the bees health. I personally feel that it’s a bit of a ‘no brainer’. Bees invest their entire life in making this special food, on which they rely for survival. I myself believe that replacing this purpose-created food with processed white sugar has got to have a negative impact on bee health. It is a fact, however, that all beekeepers will at some point rely on sugar as a means of ensuring their bees have enough to eat in times of shortage. Bad weather, extreme cold, attack by predators, disease and other disasters can leave a colony short of food; as can an increase in brood (baby bee) production; and the only way to overcome this is to provide additional sustenance, in the form of sugar as carbohydrate. This is done by giving 
These diseases spread from bee to bee, and from colony to colony, through the normal social contact of bees going about their normal bee activity – unknowingly passing virus, bacteria, fungus, moulds and parasites between themselves and each other. As beekeepers we regularly inspect our hives for signs of these problems, and take the appropriate action to prevent or treat. Wild bees simply die from these same diseases, or at best struggle against adversity – in the meantime spreading the infections far and wide, free from human ‘interference’. From this perspective, domestic beekeeping plays a vital role in supporting honey bees to survive and thrive; beekeepers striving to protect and strengthen bee colonies against disease. Again, this is more true of small-scale beekeepers, rather than those working on an industrial scale; for as hobbyists and small-scale producers we take care to protect and maintain the health of our bees – whereas larger scale operators may be more inclined to miss the signs, with such vast populations to monitor, and may prefer to destroy rather than treat, if disease is present. They also work within a much more generous financial margin; the loss of one hive countered by the profits of another. Whereas small independent beekeepers will be working within a much tighter financial framework, reaping smaller monetary rewards whilst very likely paying out more in higher quality bee care. So, not eating honey will not ‘save’ the bees and could in fact have the total opposite effect; forcing the more responsible and environmentally aware beekeeper out of action, thus reducing the total bee population, with the resultant drop in monitoring and treatment leaving bee disease free to spread more freely. 
In the absence of sufficient wild insects it is normal practice for large-scale farmers to employ commercial beekeepers, transporting thousands of hives across thousands of miles to different locations at different times of the year, to pollinate these crops into production. Almonds, for example (the key ingredient in that vegan staple; almond milk) rely on commercial bee pollination – as do so many of the foods central to a vegan lifestyle (avocados, for example). Indeed, if you as a vegan want to truly avoid consuming products reliant on the commercial exploitation of honeybees, then your only option would be a greatly restricted diet; mainly grass-based cereal crops (wheat, oats, barley, etc), wind-pollinated plants (tomatoes – hoorah!) and non-pollinated crops (potatoes, for example). Not much fun. And not much help to the bees and other insects, nor your own health – or the environment as a whole. 
There is however a better way, and that is to buy only local and/or organic produce from small independent producers or, even better, grow your own (thus reducing the toxic load of agricultural chemicals). You could also grow pollinator-friendly flowers to feed and strengthen your local bee (and other pollinator insect) population. And you could also (here comes the curveball!) support your local small-scale beekeeper by … buying and eating their honey!
All honeys, however, are not created equal. Where the large-scale commercial beekeeper (working alongside the large scale commercial farmer) is concerned primarily with financial profit, the small-scale local beekeeper is first and foremost concerned with the welfare of their bees. Many small-scale beekeepers are also enthusiastic gardeners or allotment growers, supporting their local environment to support its local bee (and other pollinator insect) population. Buying and enjoying honey from your local small scale beekeeper actively supports that beekeeper in their endeavours. So yes, while honey – being an animal product – is technically not vegan, it very much depends on the honey, and where you – as a vegan – sit on the sliding scale of veganism. If your blanket rule is ‘no animal products, per se’ then no, you will quite rightly choose not to eat honey. But if your main concern is the ethics and morality of beekeeping practice and the welfare of honeybees, and you want to support the natural environment as a wider whole, then honey from a small local beekeeper could be for you. It is ultimately a matter of personal choice – but a choice that is better made on the basis of accurate information, as opposed to sensationalist propaganda.
SomewhereinwestCornwall 