A nearby community government funded a project for 'Beehives in every
neighborhood'. It was a small stipend with a representative giving
show and tells. This weekend I attended a small presentation which
also included the city beehive club. I got the particulars and it is
something I've always wanted to do. Anyway I'm talking with someone
about the benefits of honey and he said he personally knew of someone
who was depressed for years on medication who started drinking green
tea with honey and is now off meds and doing okay. I've mentioned
before standing in my fruit trees drinking my tea with the bees
buzzing around my noggin. Occasionally one will check the cup but too
hot.

Jim

PS The individual hives seem to be doing okay but it is the statewide
commercial hives suffering from CCD.

On Aug 5, 8:46 am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> A nearby community government funded a project for 'Beehives in every
> neighborhood'. It was a small stipend with a representative giving
> show and tells. This weekend I attended a small presentation which
> also included the city beehive club. I got the particulars and it is
> something I've always wanted to do. Anyway I'm talking with someone
> about the benefits of honey and he said he personally knew of someone
> who was depressed for years on medication who started drinking green
> tea with honey and is now off meds and doing okay. I've mentioned
> before standing in my fruit trees drinking my tea with the bees
> buzzing around my noggin. Occasionally one will check the cup but too
> hot.
>
> Jim
>
> PS The individual hives seem to be doing okay but it is the statewide
> commercial hives suffering from CCD.

My mother actually turned me on to local raw honey and it's hard to
imagine not having it around someday. I was also lucky to find a semi-
local beekeeper who has honey in tons of types, red bamboo, thistle,
clover, orange blossom, and on and on with so many exotic offerings I
can't recall. Red Bamboo is amazing and very good paired with a number
of teas, especially darker ones. Really cool if you can get into it,
plus there's honey mead which is great too! Personally I'm happy to
just pay the local guys to handle it but if it weren't for the getting
stung and sticky/cleanup bits I'd do it in a heartbeat. Best of luck
and I for one would love to be kept up to date on the venture.

- Dominic

A Georgian (ex Soviet) I have worked with has bought a small tea
garden and has hives of bees busily making honey from Camellia
sinensis flowers. As a teaman I dislike this - tea bushes should be
kept in the non flowering juvenile phase of rapid leaf production by
strict training and severe pruning - flowering bushes equals bad
husbandry and butts should be kicked.
As a businessman I see "Tea Honey" as a great product extension to my
retail range of exotic teas and just sqeezable into the self imposed
but oft confining title of "Nothing But Tea". However the European
Union has very strict import restrictions on honey and Georgia has not
yet done its homework to meet them, so as yet Georgian Tea Honey is
still on the commercial drawing board.
I'd be interested to know if anyone has seen genuine tea honey offered
anywhere on their travels.

Nigel at Teacraft (and at Nothing But Tea)


On Aug 5, 1:46*pm, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> A nearby community government funded a project for 'Beehives in every
> neighborhood'. *It was a small stipend with a representative giving
> show and tells. *This weekend I attended a small presentation which
> also included the city beehive club. *I got the particulars and it is
> something I've always wanted to do. *Anyway I'm talking with someone
> about the benefits of honey and he said he personally knew of someone
> who was depressed for years on medication who started drinking green
> tea with honey and is now off meds and doing okay. *I've mentioned
> before standing in my fruit trees drinking my tea with the bees
> buzzing around my noggin. *Occasionally one will check the cup but too
> hot.

Nigel > writes:

> A Georgian (ex Soviet) I have worked with has bought a small tea
> garden and has hives of bees busily making honey from Camellia
> sinensis flowers. As a teaman I dislike this - tea bushes should be
> kept in the non flowering juvenile phase of rapid leaf production by
> strict training and severe pruning - flowering bushes equals bad
> husbandry and butts should be kicked.

I wonder if you could elaborate on this. Specifically, are you saying
that tea plants that are being kept for, well, filling our cups should
*never* be allowed to flower and bear fruit? And could you please say
exactly what kind of pruning and training will prevent flowering?

/Lew
---
Lew Perin /
http://www.panix.com/~perin/babelcarp.html

Tea is my #1 passion. Honey is #2. An excellent source for new taste
are the ethnic stores. The Arabic stores use it in their pastries
like baklava so carry the different brands usually with comb and
unpasturized. Talking to the honey guys is like talking to the tea
guys. A lot of passion. One part of our state is famous for
cantaloupes, watermelons, pumpkins which you find locally but worth a
trip just for the best honey I've ever tasted. Our commercial raw
honey comes from a mountain community noted for its wild flowers. I
think the one thing that destroys the taste of tea is sweetness. So I
never add honey to tea but everything else!

Jim

PS The club told me there is a 'Johnny Appleseed' of wild hives. He
establishes hives all over the West and SouthWest. When he comes
through town he has buckets of honey he harvested for sampling.
Nothing is for sale. It is by invitation only. I'll have to suck up
to someone to get in on that treat. I'll keep you posted. The first
benchmark is setting up the hives in the Spring. The second harvest
the following September.


Dominic T. wrote:
> On Aug 5, 8:46 am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
....sweetness...
> My mother actually turned me on to local raw honey and it's hard to
> imagine not having it around someday. I was also lucky to find a semi-
> local beekeeper who has honey in tons of types, red bamboo, thistle,
> clover, orange blossom, and on and on with so many exotic offerings I
> can't recall. Red Bamboo is amazing and very good paired with a number
> of teas, especially darker ones. Really cool if you can get into it,
> plus there's honey mead which is great too! Personally I'm happy to
> just pay the local guys to handle it but if it weren't for the getting
> stung and sticky/cleanup bits I'd do it in a heartbeat. Best of luck
> and I for one would love to be kept up to date on the venture.
>
> - Dominic

On Aug 6, 9:41*am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> Tea is my #1 passion. *Honey is #2. *
...buzzz...snip...
> Talking to the honey guys is like talking to the tea
> guys. *A lot of passion. *One part of our state is famous for
> cantaloupes, watermelons, pumpkins which you find locally but worth a
> trip just for the best honey I've ever tasted. *Our commercial raw
> honey comes from a mountain community noted for its wild flowers. *I
> think the one thing that destroys the taste of tea is sweetness. *So I
> never add honey to tea but everything else!
>
> Jim

Very cool, I never knew you were into honey. I really enjoy talking to
them as well, it is infinitely interesting and from my math/computer/
geek side I find the natural perfection and efficiency in design of
the honeycomb to be awe-inspiring. I'm not normally one for any sort
of sweetener myself, but my occasional exceptions are only for a few
honey's and raw or yellow lump sugar. When I have a sore throat, want
something sweet, or just for some strange reason. Sometimes it is just
a basic Ceylon or even a Red Rose/Salada teabag steeped quickly and a
nice copious amount of honey once it has cooled a good bit.

I touched on it in my first reply, but the cleanup must be terrible.
I've seen the spotless facilities of my local guy and I have seen how
sticky and covered everything is when it's running. It must be
laborious and massively time consuming, but I guess like anything it
can be made enjoyable and relaxing. I just have a natural aversion to
sticky and it would be my personal nightmare/hell. Unless there is a
trick beyond patience and time to cleanup.

- Dominic

My wife adds honey and soy milk to her tea. When I get the sniffles I
drink the teas that only taste good when you get sick. I asked the
guys about the extraction equipment I would have to buy. They said
they wrap the boxed hives in a large bag, take it to someone who does
it for a nominal charge plus part of the honey. Now I see why there
isnt more comb in honey. The centrifuge sucks the honey out of the
cells leaving the comb intact so next year the bees dont have to start
over. I want the honey with the debris since I'm use to drinking puer
and finding whatever.

Jim

PS Honey drips. No way around it. Even a honey bear looks like
Vesuvius after a while.

Dominic T. wrote:
> On Aug 6, 9:41?am, Space Cowboy > wrote:
> > Tea is my #1 passion. ?Honey is #2. ?
....now honeycomb be my baby...50's lyric...
> Very cool, I never knew you were into honey. I really enjoy talking to
> them as well, it is infinitely interesting and from my math/computer/
> geek side I find the natural perfection and efficiency in design of
> the honeycomb to be awe-inspiring. I'm not normally one for any sort
> of sweetener myself, but my occasional exceptions are only for a few
> honey's and raw or yellow lump sugar. When I have a sore throat, want
> something sweet, or just for some strange reason. Sometimes it is just
> a basic Ceylon or even a Red Rose/Salada teabag steeped quickly and a
> nice copious amount of honey once it has cooled a good bit.
>
> I touched on it in my first reply, but the cleanup must be terrible.
> I've seen the spotless facilities of my local guy and I have seen how
> sticky and covered everything is when it's running. It must be
> laborious and massively time consuming, but I guess like anything it
> can be made enjoyable and relaxing. I just have a natural aversion to
> sticky and it would be my personal nightmare/hell. Unless there is a
> trick beyond patience and time to cleanup.
>
> - Dominic