[Goatherd]

  Morning all      I'm not a bee keeper

     Our son now 29 has for many years had a spoon of  local honey everyday to help against
     his hayfever  Now he really likes oil seed rape honey but it has no help to hayfever problems,
     so he has garden honey What is the difference between set honey and runny clear honey
     We have been told some thing about fructose and glucose   Just interested

[DavidandCollette]

He should be taking honey from the most local source, and have what is seasonally available. The theory is that the honey contains the pollen that causes the hay fever, and the small amounts should help to build resistance. In my book, runny honey is for porridge and set honey for toast, so it doesn't run off and waste 

[Goatherd]

In my book, runny honey is for porridge and set honey for toast, so it doesn't run off and waste 

  I like your thinking

[macgro7]

Sorry to say but rape seed honey is the cheapest cr*p which even bees dotb want to eat. Unfortunately there is soooo much of it grown and they have lots of cheap honey left.
It sets very quickly - which is a problem because you have to remove from the new give as soon as possible otherwise it will set inside and even bees won't be able to eat it and you won't be able to take it out yourself.
All honey (As long as it hasn't been paterised) will set within a certain period of time. Rape honey sets very quickly. That's the only difference.
My father in law bought a beautiful mountain honey in Turkey but threw it away afte it see. He though it set because it was fake honey made of sugar.
NO! if you pasterise honey (I.e. heat it up to a certain temperature) you will prevent it from setting, at the same time you will kill all potentially harmful bacteria, spores and enzymes. HOWEVER most of them are beneficial to you! Someone mentioned honey acting as a vaccine against hay fever and allergies. This is true but pasterised honey from the supermarket will not benefit you at all as all that is left in it is sugar. It has yo be are honey.

[cloddopper]

Runny honey has not crystalized . It forms sugar crystals unaided often quite coarse ones but if you are clever , you add a couple of teaspoons of a fine commercial honey to a big jar of your own and stir it in well then the honey takes on the fine crystal form , use that to fix the crystal size of future jars .

 If you beat your honey with a pig tail in a powerdrill for 10 min or so ( no not bash your partner) a day or so after adding the seed crystals have be added it will become a creamy colour & be soft .
 But due to having the air entrained in it ,  it totally fills the jar to make the weight of 454 or 500 gram jars. 

 Some folk  take pollen or pollen tablets  to help them become accustomed to pollen in their locality but like has been said  get it from a local keeper as Holland & Barratt sort of rubbish  is often imported .

 You could also try chewing a pinhead of local bee propolis as a prophylactic for sensitivity to local pollens .

IIRC oaks & silver birch are usually the first major irritant pollens available in large quantities , grass pollen  follows on closely

[DavidandCollette]

 You could also try chewing a pinhead of local bee propolis as a prophylactic for sensitivity to local pollens .

Just don't plan on doing anything else for the day

[ZacB]

     We have been told some thing about fructose and glucose   Just interested

Honey with a high percentage of Glucose, such as Oil Seed Rape, set/crystallise a lot quicker than those with a lower percentage.
When transformed into a pale soft set Honey with a fine crystal structure and consistency of margarine it takes a lot to beat on a bit of toast - bit of a dark art which takes a bit of patience.

[Dogwalker]

My bees honey naturally goes to a soft creamy set with nothing done to it apart from straining out the bits of wax and bee and leaving in a cool cupboard.  Even a jar that had got lost at the back of the shelf for three years was still soft set.It all depends what the bees forage on.
 

[cloddopper]

My bees honey naturally goes to a soft creamy set with nothing done to it apart from straining out the bits of wax and bee and leaving in a cool cupboard.  Even a jar that had got lost at the back of the shelf for three years was still soft set.It all depends what the bees forage on.

 I never managed that in my time as a semi commercial keeper with 100 summer hives & dozens of neuc boxes .

Any idea what your main forages are .   Do you have a pollen chart & check the colour of what's coming into the hive ?

[Dogwalker]

Sorry can't help much on that info.  The bees mostly look after themselves, they don't need food and water twice a day.

Rural mid Wales.  Fields, hedges, trees, local village gardens but no osr or other planted forage crops.I love seeing all the different colours of pollen they bring in but I'm usually getting on with the next job so don't remember to look it up.

[cloddopper]

Watching bees today many have been in our thousand of so bulbs in flower.
They are hammering the leylandii from next doors forest aka hedge & are also sampling the ivy berries that still have a bit of something in/on them .

 They are also collecting pollen & nectar from the hundreds of thousands of St David's wort that abound around here  ( Ammanford )

[Dogwalker]

St David's wort?    A welsh version of St.John's wort?
Some of mine were on the plum and greengage blossom outside their front door, don't where the others were flying off too.  If we don't get harder frosts maybe I'll get some fruit this year.  First time the trees have had much blossom on them.
 I'm hoping for less wind later in the week to have a look in the hive, they were starting up nicely a month ago when we had the last warm spell.

[cloddopper]

No not St Johns wort .
It's a very very common Welsh weed round like a green daisy in leaf shape … a singular small  plant max height about 6 inches high max by 4 inches dia  ,has white flowers and when the seed sets  if you touch them they explode throwing out tiny bean pod shaped seeds up to about 18 inches away,   nothing like shepherds purse but spreads the seeds in the same manner. 
 Can't find a picture of it at present but our newly seeded lawn has produced dozens of the dam thing , the raised beds also have more than their fair share at present .  So long as I weed them out before they seed they're done in .

 If you can ,  use a long pole and drape old dust sheets over the plum tree, whenever a frost is forecast ….till the end of April or better still first week of May  .  I had dwarf plums & apples so it was easy for me .

Worcester fruit growers used to burn green wood on a forecast frost night to produce a blanket of warm smoke in the still air to protect the trees  .

[Dogwalker]

A photo would be useful if you get the chance please.  I know which are weeds but not always the names.
It's been -2 the last three nights and I'm working at capacity so the trees will have to take their chances.  Not sure if their sheltered position makes it warmer or colder, we'll see.