# Medical-grade honey??????



## readytogo (Apr 6, 2013)

Frolicking through the woods as a child brought great joy and also plenty of pain and tears and the dreaded alcohol or iodine with many scrapes and scratches I walk home from the fields to enter the home cure hell of grandmother but sometimes it was pure heaven, I could eat my medicine, pure bee honey was the cure and how sweet it was, but now I come across this article and they make it sound like a great new discovery and folks let's be realistic ,back in my days every home in the hills had a big jar or many mason jars full of pure honey still in the honey comb, it was candy to all of us. Oh well lived and learn something every day.
http://news.yahoo.com/video/medical-grade-honey-providing-sweet-235908780.html
ps.Keep some at home with a bottle of vinegar, you can never be wrong......


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## Caribou (Aug 18, 2012)

Honey has been used medically for a very long time. Running honey through an extra filter an and declaring it medical grade means that you can charge through the wazu for it. Sugar works as well though the honey is easier to keep in place. Diabetic sores and infected wounds are two example where I would want honey.


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## AuntB (Nov 24, 2015)

Honey is great for other stuff besides cuts. Burns, colds, beauty and health. One of those things that has been around forever and an amazing natural cure. Lemon, honey and vinegar should be prepped.


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## CrackbottomLouis (May 20, 2012)

There is a particular type of honey from new Zealand that supposedly has strong antibiotic, antifungal, anti whatever ails ya properties it's from bees that mainly live among teatree plants. It's called Manuka honey. I don't know about all the claims but it sure is good.


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## Cotton (Oct 12, 2013)

Medicinally speaking, the temp at which the bee keeper processes his honey is the difference from medicinal honey and plain honey… “plain honey” only useful as a sweetener.

The crap you by at a store shelf is most definitely ruined honey. Short story, if honey is heated above 105 degrees the enzymes that make honey medicinal are destroyed.

Honey producers, even small timers use heaters to get honey to flow out of combs in spinners. If you want true medicinal honey, you have to know the bee keeper. You have to know how he processes his combs.

In its true medicinal form, honey is a wonderful medicine in too many applications to list. If you buy honey from a store shelf without knowing how it was processed, use it as a sweetener, not medicine, imho….

Be aware…. Processed honey on “large” store shelves is ruined, just a sweetener, nothing medicinal about it. Honey you buy at walmart or any other chain store has been heated to temps over 140 degrees to get it to flow for the production line. It has no medicinal value.

To get medicinal honey… you have to know the bee keeper.


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## Oomingmak (Feb 26, 2015)

Yes.......... honey has been used for thousands of years, it was a favourite remedy with the Egyptians.

We are getting a couple of new hives in the spring. Looking forward to it. I imagine we will have quite a bit of honey to share with friends and neighbours in the fall. With all the alfalfa and canola grown around here, the bees produce a pile of honey.


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## bogey (Aug 10, 2015)

We too are getting bees this spring. Cannot wait. Here, few people process honey with heat because it's so darn hot, it flows without being heated just fine. Most just use extractors using centrifugal force. No heat required. Have been attending different bee club meetings in the extended area - three routinely and one other just a few times. No one I've spoken with uses heat as it's simply not needed. So it may be a consideration in how available unheated honey is depending on the area in which you live.


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## helicopter5472 (Feb 25, 2013)

O.K> I am honey stupid...
It's from local farm down the road and is spun out by a machine. So after keeping a jar of it for almost a year, it crystalized. So I always been told to heat it up to un-crystalize it which has always worked. So is it now just a sweetener since it has been heated? Can you just eat it in the crystalized form and get more out of it than heating it?


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## jnrdesertrats (Jul 3, 2010)

Well I am no expert but I doubt you got it over 140 that seems really hot. Maybe use a thermometer.


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

I'm taking our first hives to get bees put in them this Friday, that'll be several newbie beekeepers around here come spring. You old timers get ready!


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## bogey (Aug 10, 2015)

helicopter5472 said:


> O.K> I am honey stupid...
> It's from local farm down the road and is spun out by a machine. So after keeping a jar of it for almost a year, it crystalized. So I always been told to heat it up to un-crystalize it which has always worked. So is it now just a sweetener since it has been heated? Can you just eat it in the crystalized form and get more out of it than heating it?


Actually, the fact that it has crystallized is not a bad thing. Means it wasn't heat treated and has all the good stuff in it. As far as reheating it, most people advise putting in a pot of hot water. Not while the burner is going. And it can take a bit of melt, stir, melt. But I would watch the temp if you have a thermometer. You can eat it crystalized, but texturally - blech! But if you are using it in tea or something similar and it will be melted anyway, shouldn't matter.

AND, this I want to try. If you've ever had "spun honey", it is basically honey that has been crystalized but in a controlled way. The crystals are so tiny they are actually pleasing on the tongue. Will almost melt in your mouth. If you have access to some spun honey or want to try to do it yourself, once you do it, it keeps it stable and won't get in big crystals again. Keeps longer. Lots of info online on how to do it. I think you can use a stand mixer, mix for like 20-30 minutes, let it rest, do it again. Something like that. Just found it interesting. Want to try it myself but it's so low on my list right now!


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## bogey (Aug 10, 2015)

tsrwivey said:


> I'm taking our first hives to get bees put in them this Friday, that'll be several newbie beekeepers around here come spring. You old timers get ready!


So jealous! Won't get ours until March or April. We have been very fortunate that we have lots of supportive people in this area and have found a mentor who is a commercial keeper. Hoping it will help us keep them alive.

What kind of hives are you using? Traditional Langstroth? We are doing a combination of Langstroth and horizontal. Not top bar. But horizontal. Will still use traditional frames so we can use easily found extraction equipment.


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## tsrwivey (Dec 31, 2010)

We'll be using Langstroth. We won't actually get our bees until March either. Tomorrow I take the hives to have the bees put in them for us.


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## bogey (Aug 10, 2015)

Gotcha! We will be basically be getting a nuc for two of ours. will be five frames of brood and queen. We just bring empty frames and trade them. And we are buying two 10 frame hives complete with all hardware. The weather is so weird, it'll either help or hurt but I haven't figured out which yet. Really excited about the bees. Have wanted to do this for well over 10 years.


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## Sybil6 (Jan 28, 2013)

I brought home a crippled bee that hit a bus window at school and put it in our bee box with the queen and now we have huge buzzing bee box. So far we're still clueless about how to get the honey out though. We don't have a huge hive, maybe 50 at most, so we probably don't have much yet anyway and most of them died this winter, but the queen is alive so I'm sure it'll keep on buzzing once spring hits. Any other information about how to get the honey out would be great though!


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## bogey (Aug 10, 2015)

Are you using frames? What kind of hives do you have? Wouldn't pull honey until spring. They use it for food during the winter.

Wait 50 bees? I'm confused. Pictures would help.


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