FAQ's

Yes, our honey is proudly Scottish and locally produced on the Balcarres Estate in the East Neuk of Fife, Scotland. At East Neuk Apiaries, we use single apiary jarring, meaning every jar comes exclusively from one of our own hives. We do not blend or buy in honey, ensuring that every jar is as authentic and pure as possible. This commitment is central to our values of sustainability and transparency. 

No, we do not pasteurise our honey. At East Neuk Apiaries, we believe in keeping our honey as natural as possible, ensuring it retains all its natural enzymes, nutrients, and flavours. Our honey is gently filtered and jarred straight from the hive, preserving its raw, authentic quality. This commitment to natural production is part of our core values. 

Our bees forage on the seasonal flora on the Balcarres Estate as well as the surrounding area, including oilseed rape in spring and wildflowers in summer. Each jar reflects the unique taste and aroma of the surrounding landscape. 

No, we don’t routinely feed sugar syrup to our bees. They are left with their natural honey stores, ensuring they stay healthy and nourished. Only in instances where hives are weak or unable to make their own honey do we provide them a little support with sugar syrup.

Honey is a unique product with an indefinite shelf life when stored correctly, but EU regulations mandate a "best before" date for prepacked honey. This is due to consumer protection laws, which ensure proper labelling of food products. According to Directive 2001/110/EC, honey must carry a durability indication, typically in the format "best before" or "best before end," even though it doesn’t truly expire under proper storage conditions. In Scotland and the wider UK, these regulations are applied to all honey products to maintain traceability and compliance with food safety standards​.

Honey is not typically considered vegan because it’s produced by bees. However, we ensure our honey is ethically produced with the highest care for our bees. 

Single apiary honey comes from a single location known as an apiary where we typically keep 1-10 hives (depending on what the surrounding biodiversity can support), ensuring unique flavour and full traceability. We never mix honey from different locations. 

No, we do not cut or clip the wings of our queens at East Neuk Apiaries. We believe in keeping our colonies as natural as possible and allowing our bees to behave according to their instincts.

Some beekeepers choose to clip a queen’s wings as a management technique. This is typically done to prevent the queen from flying away during swarming, which helps the beekeeper maintain the hive's population and avoid losing part of the colony. In addition, clipped wings can make it easier to locate and manage the queen during hive inspections.

However, we prefer to focus on sustainable and non-invasive methods of hive management. By providing sufficient space and careful monitoring, we aim to reduce the need for such practices while prioritising the health and well-being of our bees. This aligns with our commitment to ethical and natural beekeeping.

Yes, we use queen excluders at East Neuk Apiaries. Queen excluders are metal or plastic grids that allow worker bees to pass through but prevent the queen from entering the honey supers, where honey is stored. This ensures that the honey harvested is free from brood (larvae or pupae) and remains pure for consumption.

The use of queen excluders helps maintain the quality of the honey, as it prevents the queen from laying eggs in the honey frames. This is especially important for producing clean, brood-free honey, which is essential for honey production and consumer satisfaction. Additionally, it reduces the risk of accidentally harming the queen during honey harvesting, as she is kept safely in the brood chamber, where the worker bees can continue their work.

By using queen excluders, we also promote efficient hive management. It ensures that the colony's brood and honey are kept separate, allowing us to harvest honey without disturbing the queen or her brood. This practice aligns with our focus on ethical beekeeping, which prioritises the health of the colony while ensuring that our honey remains of the highest quality.

No, our honey is not certified organic. Achieving organic certification for honey in Scotland is extremely challenging due to the nature of beekeeping and the agricultural landscape. Honeybees forage over vast areas—up to 3 miles from their hives—making it nearly impossible to ensure that they only visit organic plants. Given the diversity of land use in Scotland, including conventional farming, wild flora, and residential gardens, maintaining an exclusively organic forage area is impractical.

However, at East Neuk Apiaries, we work closely with the Balcarres Estate and its farmers to minimise the impact of farming methods on our bees. By fostering a collaborative relationship, we promote bee-friendly practices such as reducing pesticide use, timing applications to avoid active foraging periods, and planting pollinator-friendly crops. These efforts help support the health and sustainability of our bees, ensuring they thrive while producing the high-quality honey we are proud to offer.

No, we do not feed sugar syrup while our honey supers are on the hives. This is primarily to prevent any risk of sugar syrup being stored in the honey supers, which would later be extracted and jarred as honey. Such contamination would compromise the purity and quality of the honey, which is something we are committed to avoiding. 

Honey should be kept in a cool, dry place, away from direct sunlight, and does not require refrigeration. Always ensure the lid is tightly sealed, as honey can absorb moisture from the air, which may eventually lead to fermentation.