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Bees are major pollinators that contribute greatly to the world’s environment and food production. However, our humble honey bees are becoming increasingly endangered due to disease, pests, urbanization and climate change, among other factors.  So, we all need to do our bit to protect honey bees and their habitats. Here’s five easy things you can do to help… 1. PLANT A RANGE OF FLOWERS Plant a diverse range of flowers and ensure they bloom successively to ensure there is something for the bees to forage all year-round.  The more flowers the better – and your garden will look lovely too! Honey bees are especially drawn to purple, blue, yellow and white flowers with a single row of petals to make the nectar easier to access.  Honey

We are giving away packs of Wildflower seeds to help make your garden ‘bee-friendly’ in celebration of Bee Aware month this September. Every $50 you spend* gets you a FREE packet of Wildflower seeds made of a carefully selected blend of seed-grown flowering plants that are high in nectar and pollen that bees love and thrive on.  The Wildflower mix is put together by Kingseeds, and is suitable for our NZ conditions. The seed mix includes Rudbeckia, Thyme, Red Clover, Phacelia, Echium, Salvia, Cornflower and European Poppy. Here are some steps to make your garden blooming beautiful in no time: Choose a good spot that gets all day sunPrepare the soil for sowing by removing unwanted vegetation and rough up the surface of the soil. Wildflowers don’t need large amounts of

Every September we join Honey Lovers around New Zealand to celebrate the humble honeybee and everything they do.  Bee pollination plays an important role in our agriculture and horticulture, not to mention they keep our gardens beautiful. One of the best things you can do for our buzzy friends is plant a wide variety of flowers in your garden.  The Pohutukawa tree which is also called the New Zealand Christmas tree is in full bloom around Auckland and bees are loving these red flowers Free Wildflower Seeds We’re giving away a free packet of wildflower seeds for every $50 you spend in September. Every $50 (exc. postage) you spend in a single order gets you a pack of seeds included free with your order. Spend $100 and get two packets, spend $150 and get t

Kāmahi honey deserves to be celebrated for its unique flavours that pair deliciously with all kinds of foods. Kāmahi honey comes from the Native New Zealand Kāmahi flower, which is white and spikey. The Kāmahi trees can grow up to 25 metres tall. We’re lucky enough to be able to harvest our Kāmahi honey locally in the Marlborough Sounds and the Mt. Richmond Forest Park. Kāmahi honey is a rich, golden colour and has a smooth, soft texture followed by an intense full-bodied flavour, like molasses or burnt toffee. Being a fragrant honey, it pairs deliciously with fresh fruit and creamy white mould cheeses, such as Brie and Camembert. The ideal accompaniment to a cheese platter. Kāmahi honey also makes a great base to sweet sauces, whilst being a perfect balancer

Mountain Valley Honey is excited to announce we now have beeswax back in stock! Beeswax can be described as the honeybees building material, like wood or brick for humans. It is produced by the worker bees, who use four pairs of glands under their abdomen and is produced when they gather nectar. Worker bees then use it to build the honeycomb to store the nectar in. Pure beeswax is white, but can become yellow or orange, due to natural staining from the pollen and propolis gathered when the beeswax is being produced. The colour also varies depending on the type of nectar source the bees are gathering. Our beeswax blocks are made from the wax left over at the end of the extraction process, where the wax is separated from the honey. We melt it down and pour it into moulds to

Mānuka Honey is known and loved in New Zealand and internationally for its antibacterial properties and the benefits it has for our health. However, Mānuka’s cousin, Kānuka, is making headway as a topical treatment for a variety of skin conditions that flare up over the winter months. Mānuka is a great topical treatment for wound dressings and burns. But studies show that Kānuka’s unique antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory properties makes it an effective treatment for skin conditions such as eczema, rosacea, acne, and in recent studies, coldsores. Kānuka flowers. Kānuka honey comes from a native New Zealand tree, similar to Mānuka, and has high levels of hydrogen peroxide, that naturally creates these antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory properties. The hydro

Honey bees are amazing creatures who work harmoniously together to produce the sweet, tasty honey we all know and love. Although they look similar, within a hive there are three distinctly different honey bees, each playing an important part in the honey making process. These include the Queen Bee, the drones and the worker bees. Every hive consists of one Queen Bee, hundreds of drones and 20,000-80,000 worker bees, along with brood (eggs, larvae and pupae). The role of the Queen Bee is to lay fertilized eggs. She does this by mating early in life and storing millions of sperm within her body. When she’s ready to lay eggs, she can lay up to 2,000 eggs in a single day! Drones are the male honey bees, who are hatched from unfertilized eggs. Their sole task is mating new

Behind the scenes, the team at Mountain Valley Honey (MVH) have been busy working away at something rather exciting. After 10 years, Murray and Nicky felt it was time for a fresh new look, so they enlisted the help of local design company NOKNOK to help. Together with NOKNOK, the team created a new design for their labels that reflects the quality of the honey but keeps the essence of the old label’s customers associate with. The team have kept the colours of the labels the same as the existing labels but created individual hand-drawn illustrations for each variety of honey. However, customers can be assured that inside the jars is still the same high quality, natural honey – just in a unique new label! MVH also enlisted the help of NOKNOK to put together our bra

At Mountain Valley Honey, a common question we get asked is “why is some honey in liquid form, and others more solid?” In this month’s blog post, owner and master beekeeper, Murray Elwood will give you the answer. Crystallization (or settling) is a natural process for almost all raw honeys. It shows the honey hasn’t been over-filtered or processed, as crystallization occurs when honey contains minute particles of pollen and wax. Our raw Kāmahi Honey showing different stages of crystallization, a natural process that shows the honey has not been over-processed. Why does honey crystalize? Crystallization occurs in raw honey due to it naturally containing high levels of glucose (anywhere from 25 to 40%). Glucose is less soluble in water than Fructose, and so it more easi

“Our role as beekeepers is to ensure our bees are in the best environment, that they are well looked after, so they can produce good quality honey.” When it comes to producing a jar of Mountain Valley Honey, there is a lot that goes on behind the scenes, and our team of beekeepers play a crucial part. So, in this month’s blog, we thought we would give you a little insight into what that part is. Mountain Valley Honey co-owner, Murray Elwood has been a beekeeper for 26 years and says that a beekeeper’s work changes from season to season. “Each day we start with an 8am meeting to go over health and safety, and confirm who is going where for the day. “At this time of year, we do our final check of the beehives before the honey flow. “We check for any disease

As a primary producer, Mountain Valley Honey feels a connection to the land and the bees during the honey making process. That’s why MVH know how easy it is to get caught up in the “convenience” options of today’s busy world. But co-owner, Nicky Elwood, says it’s important to her and the business to continually look for ways to reduce their waste and use products that can be reused or repurposed. “It’s important to us to be sustainable whilst ensuring our honey remains at the highest quality, and the product arrives to the customer safely.” Mountain Valley Honey have been looking particularly at their use of plastics within their processes and how they can reduce it – and they’ve come up with a clever solution. “Our 1kg jars are our most popular si

In honey markets worldwide, there will always be honey that is marketed as something it’s not. So, obtaining a ‘Certificate of Licence’ is crucial to ensuring the authenticity of honey for consumers. Mountain Valley Honey have just received ours through a membership programme allowing the use of the known and trusted ‘New Zealand Made’ trademark. The ‘New Zealand Made’ trademark is a brand to showcase New Zealand’s fabulous products, produced right here in Aotearoa. For Mountain Valley Honey co-owner, Nicky Elwood, it’s a fantastic way to promote and have pride in New Zealand and the amazing products it grows and produces. “We join every year, as we love having the trademark on our products to give our customers that extra confidence they’re buying a