Organic Beekeeping

[Newbeeneil]

After recent discussions about organic honey I thought some members may be interested in the hoops an organic beekeeper would have to go through to produce organic honey in the UK.
The attached document outlines all the rules for growing food and managing livestock to organic standards generally but if you want to "cut to the chase" go to the last section 3.17 on page 184 for the bee stuff. Although this is the only section that relates to the keeping of bees a beekeeper would still have to comply with several other sections of the document as indicated in the first paragraph.

https://www.soilassociation.org/media/15931/farming-and-growing-standards.pdf
I wondered if this might be worth a "sticky" as it does crop up from time to time.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I’ve linked it in the stickies thread.

 

[JohnRB]

After recent discussions about organic honey I thought some members may be interested in the hoops an organic beekeeper would have to go through to produce organic honey in the UK.
The attached document outlines all the rules for growing food and managing livestock to organic standards generally but if you want to "cut to the chase" go to the last section 3.17 on page 184 for the bee stuff. Although this is the only section that relates to the keeping of bees a beekeeper would still have to comply with several other sections of the document as indicated in the first paragraph.

https://www.soilassociation.org/media/15931/farming-and-growing-standards.pdf
I wondered if this might be worth a "sticky" as it does crop up from time to time.

Surprised to see the line about not mutilating bees by clipping queen wings - what has that got to do with them being organic?

 

[Polymorph]

good idea for a thread and I think most people try to follow a number of the principles. Though I am surprised by some of the elements, such as hives made mainly of natural materials which I assume rules out poly. As I have all the nucs in poly, I guess it's not a good start.

 

[Ian123]

I’m pretty sure(I may be wrong) that Murray looked at organic certification some years ago and decided it was too much of a faff. He as normal is likely to be the most informed person to comment.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Yes I can imagine how heather honey could have an organic origin

 

[Newbeeneil]

Yes I can imagine how heather honey could have an organic origin

Probably one of the few places you could get far enough away from cultivated land.

 

[Hedgerow Honey]

No chance with us as the NT spray bracken with extrubiance, colonies as well we found out!!!.