channel 4 tonight at half 8.

[biglongdarren]

Jimmy Dorethy investigates manuka honey.

Darren

 

[REDWOOD]

Thanks Dar

 

[thorn]

Thanks for letting us know abput the programme, but I switched off after 5 minutes. The presenter was one of the most irritating little squits I've seen on television, and there's a lot of competition for that title. What's more, he didn't seem to understand basic English grammar. And most importantly, he didn't actually impart any knowledge.
I'm sure this forum will let me know if I actually missed anything worthwhile.

 

[Russel]

Apparently, it's all to do with the pollen they collect.
I did wonder where all the excess manuka honey came from?

 

[RoseCottage]

It struck me that the continual references to Manuka were a red herring to his points.

The manufacturer of so called medical grade honey...lol ... confirmed that non sterilised honey enables bacteria to regrow. Any honey that was sterilised would perform in the same way. There was nothing unique about Manuka honey per se, except for truly excellent marketing.

Sam

 

[enrico]

Actually that's not quite right, all sterilised honeys kill bacteria but the manuka stops the re growth, or that's how I heard it anyway!
What I want to know is how the British supplier they showed could possibly say that the apparent small amount of tea tree bushes they had produced enough of a percentage of nectar for them to call it manuka honey..... I would challenge that! I have tee tree bushes and the bees never touch them,
At least the doctor said that people should get their honey from local bee keepers!
E

 

[alanf]

Actually that's not quite right, all sterilised honeys kill bacteria but the manuka stops the re growth, or that's how I heard it

That's what he said, but it doesn't make sense. If a bacteria colony is killed, then it's dead. It's pushing up the daisies, joined the choir invisibule, it's not going to "regrow".

He is selling sterilised honey, and it appears that by adding "manuka" to the label he can increase the price. To market the honey medically he has to show what he produces has some effect. He does not have to prove that any honey, sterilised the same way, could not be used instead.

Nurofen makers (£2.50) don't have to run double blind trials to show their product is better than generic Ibuprofen (25p). Or closer to home, Apiguard don't have to show their product is a better mite treatment than generic thymol, just that it's better than not treating.

 

[Brian Bush]

Watched this programme on catch-up this morning. Seemed like a quite sensible report if a little light on real detail. I think we should applaud all programmes that keep honey in the public eye and well done to the expert who said buy from your local supplier of honey.

 

[charlievictorbravo]

I'm on holiday in Australia at the moment and have spoken to a couple of honey producers. One large producer in Currumbin on the NSW/QLND border has some Aussi Manuka honey i.e made by bees feeding primarily on teatree bushes and he's pleased that the apparent over-consumpion of Manuka honey by dilution with other honeys has been exposed - he said his next batch of Manuka is going up in price by $50 a kilo. One problem he has had is with the testing of this honey - he sent samples from the same batch to three testing labs and got three completely different results so he's wondering if the 15+ and 30+ is just a bit of overblown hype and marketing by the Kiwis.

The other producer I met at a Farmers' Market in Noosaville, Queensland was just pleased to extol the virtues of local Australian honey. She was selling four different types of honey @ $10 per kilo which is very cheap compared with local honey in Cornwall. In the supermarkets, Aussi honey is nearer $8 a kilo. Being semi tropical, they have a much longer season than the UK but are still weather dependent - a drought knocks back production considerably.

It appears that most honey producers here move their bees around to pick up pollinating work with fruit producers but not to the extent that the Americans do. They are quite pleased to be able to sell Aussi bees to the Americans and are really worried about any possible import of Varroa into the country.

I'll watch the C4 programme when I return.

CVB

 

[enrico]

That's what he said, but it doesn't make sense. If a bacteria colony is killed, then it's dead. It's pushing up the daisies, joined the choir invisibule, it's not going to "regrow".

.

He suggested that the honey killed some bacteria close to the honey sample on a Petri dish. The remaining bacteria re grew where ordinary honeys were used but did not re grow on the now dead area on the manuka dish. Not saying that is right but that is what he said! Ie the manuka stopped the re growth where re growth was possible!
E

 

[keith pierce]

thanks. I just set the record on the tele as I am out at the beginners course

 

[biglongdarren]

thanks. I just set the record on the tele as I am out at the beginners course

your maybe a day too late keith, you didn't miss much anyway.

Darren

 

[RoseCottage]

I agree with what you heard but I also thought I heard him say when pushed the only honey in. His test that was medical grade was his Manuka... he had previously said that the medical grade was sterilised... the other test honey wasn't sterilised.

All the best,
Sam

 

[alanf]

He suggested that the honey killed some bacteria close to the honey sample on a Petri dish. The remaining bacteria re grew where ordinary honeys were used but did not re grow on the now dead area on the manuka dish. Not saying that is right but that is what he said! Ie the manuka stopped the re growth where re growth was possible!
E

That may be the impression he wanted to give the viewer. There was no mention of re growing on a "dead area". It's on 4oD at around 5 minutes if anyone wants to check.

He says at 5:20 "All honey will kill bugs but the beauty of our manuka honey is that it will prevent the regrowth of bugs and that's the difference between medical grade honey and a food honey".

He does not say the difference between "medical grade manuka honey" and "medical grade honey without manuka", he says the difference between "medical grade" and "food honey". Jimmy goes on to clarify that "you can't just slap any old honey to a wound." Which is fair enough because it's not sterile, there are bacteria in honey which will not grow while it is in honey but might if it's diluted. They won't be live and able to grow if it's made sterile or "medical grade" as he explains earlier. If "all honey will kill bugs" that's the concentration of sugars because that's what all honeys have in common and how sugar is used as preservative. The distinction of adding the manuka has not been established. It's flim-flam, like the words in hair product ads.

The claim is carefully worded or not specific enough to be disprovable which would get the marketing banned. The marketing is designed to give the impression that a spurious difference makes the product more effective without having to prove it. As the scientist from Leicester University in the later interview said, "the evidence is not there"... "I would suggest you seek out your local beekeeper and buy honey from him or her".

The manuka honey producers have found a unique selling distinction which they are exploiting. That is their choice, but there is no objective proof that using manuka honey is any different to other honeys in a realistic scenario. Neither is there proof that the +10, +30 or whatever rating is anything more than an arbitrary scale and as previous posters have suggested, not even reliably measured. What I find difficult is when the public ask what this manuka honey thing is about at open days and I have to steer a path between reproducing pseudo science and being critical of other beekeepers' marketing methods; going either way doesn't help local beekeeping.

 

[RoseCottage]

I guess I object to the obvious guff about Manuka honey. However, I have to take my hat off to the kiwis for such effective and shameless marketing.

Now I wonder should I sterilise this year's bounty and label it as medically effective and proven as Manuka...

Sam

 

[user 6228]

Its all about phenols.. Phenols are well known as anti septics. They are toxic.
Trichlorophenol or more commonly known as TCP is a household antiseptic.
Some plant produce phenols, in their warfare against each other and their predators and parasites.
Some honeys are high in plant phenols, manuka is one of them.
Now go and find a british plant honey that has high phenol content and make your fortune

 

[pargyle]

Its all about phenols.. Phenols are well known as anti septics. They are toxic.
Trichlorophenol or more commonly known as TCP is a household antiseptic.
Some plant produce phenols, in their warfare against each other and their predators and parasites.
Some honeys are high in plant phenols, manuka is one of them.
Now go and find a british plant honey that has high phenol content and make your fortune

Thyme ? Bees will forage on it if it is available ...

Borage is a Eudicot and that may have phenols as well ? Borage has lots of uses in medicine .. very well documented.

Not sure how much gets to the pollen on these plants but I read somewhere that bees foraging on Thyme do collect a small amount of thymol which has a secondary effect in the hive against Varroa.

So ... Thyme & Borage Honey ... sounds disgusting so it will probably sell like hotcakes to the Manuka eating brigade ?

 

[user 6228]

Correction TCP wasnt Trichlorophenol
Wikipedia:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TCP_(antiseptic)

trichlorophenylmethyliodosalicyl (not to be confused with trichlorophenol, a common fungicide). Trichlorophenylmethyliodosalicyl was replaced as the active ingredient by a mixture of phenol and halogenated phenols in the 1950s

TCP originally had phenol structures(..phenyl...) in but now has phenols in it

just shows .. dont rely on what a chemistry teacher said to you 40 years ago!

 

[BKF Admin]

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/food-unwrapped/4od

 

[alldigging]

Thorsens guide to medical herbalism says:
Phenols and Phenolic glycosides...

example is salicylic acid: black willow, poplar, black haw, wintergreen, meadowsweet (no mention of phenols in pollen there though)

Eugenol from Cloves
Thymol from Thyme.


http://www.herbmuseum.ca/content/phenols
The flavones and flavonoids are the most common phenols. They are yellow, bitter substances often found in flowers,

and then lists:
pigenin in celery; quercitol, from which rutin is formed; kaempferol from elder and horsetail; and rotenone, from the roots of Derris elliptica