Today, honey in Africa
if not all in parts of the world is one commodity that is easily and readily
put to doubt by prospective buyers on the genuine of its state of naturality
and priority.
The simple reason for
this is basically hinged on the fact that from the past, honey is provided by
the wild comb hunters who goes about in the jungles to collect honey in the
unprofessional way they know and later adulterate. Until in the recent times
when practical beekeeping has started springing up in many countries, the
perpetual adulteration of honey collected by these comb hunters has left the
equivalent degree of perpetual doubts on the minds of prospective buyers as to
the genuine pure natural state of what is called honey to them.
Frankly, few of these
wild comb hunters will normally sell their collections without adulteration,
but this unadulterated honey will still show by odour and slight taste of what
has been collected through heavy fire works.
Adulteration is usually
perfected by pounding sugar canes and squeezing out the liquid contents which
would be boiled later, secondly by putting a lot of granulated or cubed sugar
into quantity of water and boil which will eventually turn thick and brownish
in colour having the viscosity similar to honey. The adulteration is then
perfected by mixing the content severally with the collected honey from the
wild which has been harvested in the crude way resulting to what is known as
molasses.
In some remote villages
in the northern Nigeria, it is alleged that a type of small stones can be put
into a big pot with water added and boil that will eventually turn into honey
like liquid also used in adulteration. The allegation has not been proved in
any way by me but people from this region have always affirm it.
The above brief
explanation can then answer the mostly asked questions on the purity and
natural state of honey. These questions are not many, but they must similar in
content. numbers may vary from country to country, and from continent to
continent depending on what obtains in different lands of the world, but they
must be similar in content.
It is a known fact that
in Europe, America, Australia the beekeeping vast knowledge has continue to
provide pure natural honey in these places massively to their departmental
shops and shopping malls where every body has read so much on pages of
information channels including the internet about the honey named brands
available in their land which can not be anything but honey.
On the other hand, it
is still a battle contending with answers to charade of questions often thrown
at Beekeepers in other places such as in Nigeria.
1. People often ask “is
this original honey”, there is the need for corrections to questions asked
sometimes before responding answers, for a good example, the question above
should have come in the term of “Is this pure natural honey?”
The answer from
Beekeepers should be as follows; yes, it is pure natural honey, the word original
is inappropriate, Beekeeper, honey is hygienically harvested, extracted and
thoroughly filtered devoid of artificial sweeteners, additives, emulsifiers
whatsoever.
2. Another often asked
question is how must honey taste?”. I have endured through the times in
providing the simple answer as the following:
Pure natural honey must
give a natural appealing taste on the tongue with the natural sweetness
perceived and appealing calmness must naturally accompany the qualities above
to the sense of smelling and taste.
3. Why not dark and
thick?, funny question often asked is the above and in satisfying the question
answer comes thus;
The majority of samples
of what we think to be pure natural honey are not; they are either crude
harvested honey from wild comb hunters who by their untrained manners have
destroyed greater percentage of the antiseptics, antibiotics and nutrients
contents in all these samples. They could be burnt sugarcane and sugar as
earlier explained into molasses as well.
Any honey sample with offensive
odour and unappealing taste must be something else and as well must be
injurious to your health you intend to improve.
Some of the wild comb
hunters can go to the extreme of putting their harvested honey combs in big
pots and heat the contents before pressing the honey, in this way the liquid
honey tends to be extra thick with the notion to convince buyers.
As often emphasized,
honey samples from Beekeepers that has been harvested professionally will
maintain free flow viscosity and natural golden sparkling colour ranging from
pale yellow to brown since it was not bunt as a process of harvesting nor
heated to deceive buyers.
4. Lastly in the most
four questions I researched upon is “Can pure natural honey attract ants?”. My
funny answer has always come in dual statements of Yes and No. The attraction
or repellation of ants will depends on the plants nectars and pollen collected by the bees during the process of
foraging for honey production in a particular geographical area by the bees and
the maturity age of the honey since very young honey could give the odour
similar to plants pollens and nectars.
It is a known fact that
some flowering plants naturally attracts ants mostly the wingless ones that are
non pollinators while other plants do
not, this known fact also determine which honey samples may attract ant or
otherwise.
The established fact in
that the juices and nectars are properly converted by the bees to give you the
pure natural honey expected from the bees.
In the case of ants’
attraction to your bottle of honey place the honey bottle in a small plastic container containing some
water to keep them away. The fact remains that ants depends of their sense of
smell for food since the sweet smell appeal to them and attract them to their newly discovered
source of food which is your honey.
All the statements in
this content are subjected to investigations and research works, and I do not
uphold total unquestionable knowledge.
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