Well a lot has happened since my last update. Have been to NZ and had a great time on an apiary in the northern peninsula – Haines Apiaries were kind enough to let me go out with 2 of their Beekeepers – Tony and Reece, for 2 whole days! (that would have cost a fortune if done through a travel agent!)
Soooo excited!
I arrived well before cock crow and had a nice guy take my picture. Haines is situated just outside the town of Kaitaia, they have over 4000 hives dotted about the manuka heathlands in the northern peninsula. I arrived just in the last few weeks of their winter when they were beginning to set out the overwintered hives.
Cool Guy
Tony was a lovely guy and made my 2 days very interesting.
After loading their truck with about 40 hives we set off on the 60km drive to the out apiaries. I went with Reece who is a crazy driver, the trip took an hour and a half to get to the out apiaries but so very picturesque.
The manuka heathlands are owned by the maories and they charged a rental of NZ$25 per hive – big business. Manuka is very much like a giant heather growing 7ft tall before they burn it off to regenerate. It has very pretty pink and white flowers with five petals and a nice little collecting pot for the nectar – very easy for the girls to land and sup it up.
The special thing about Manuka honey is something they call UMF- Unique Manuka Factor- so called because they can’t yet determine what the unique factor is but they can measure it!???
Personally I find the Manuka honey on sale in the UK to be foul tasting but fresh out of the hive it has a nice flavour – possibly it is treated so much before it arrives on the shelf that the taste has degraded – or they may well be pushing the point that if it tastes nasty and is a murky brown then it just has to be doing you some good!
Busy Girls
They use plastic frames a lot in NZ and the bees fill them just the same as wooden ones - if you have 4000 hives with say 3 supers and say 11 frames per super you could be looking at over 132,000 frames – way too many to be sitting with a little hammer making up wooden frames. Multiple this for the Tweedales Apiary I also visited – they had prepared 40,000 – yes, 40k – brood boxes alone for the upcoming season – plastic makes sense in these proportions.
Beauty
The land is stunningly beautiful and free of people up here in this subtropical wonderland
Water as clear as the sky!
I have never been anywhere before that was so free of pollution.
- Ninety Mile Beach
Actually 60 miles long and so firmly packed it was the shortcut home in the truck – stopping off to collect giant green muscles and pop a few bluebottles (blue coloured jellyfish) as we drove over them.
