Myddle Apiary
Our home apiary sits in the village of Myddle, surrounded by gardens, hedgerows, pasture and mature trees.
The bees have access to a varied mix of forage through the season, from early blossom and hedgerow flowers through to clover, bramble and lime later in the year.
Because we keep each harvest separate, Myddle honey can change noticeably as the season progresses. Rather than expecting one consistent flavour from the location, each batch is a snapshot of what was flowering around the village when the bees were collecting nectar.
Shotatton Apiary
Our Shotatton apiary sits in open North Shropshire countryside, surrounded by farmland, established hedgerows and wildflower meadows.
The varied landscape provides changing forage throughout the season, but later in the summer there's one particularly distinctive source nearby: Himalayan balsam.
Shotatton is the only one of our apiaries to produce our Himalayan Balsam Honey. When the bees are working the balsam, they often return to the hive dusted with its pale pollen — giving them the distinctive white stripe that earns them the nickname 'ghost bees'.
As with all our apiaries, each harvest is kept separate, allowing us to preserve that direct connection between the honey and the landscape it came from.
Lyneal Apiary
Our Lyneal apiary sits in a predominantly agricultural landscape, with livestock pasture, hedgerows and small patches of wildflowers surrounding the site.
There is plenty of willow locally, providing useful early-season forage, while the mix changes as the year progresses with hedgerow flowers, pasture plants and crops such as OSR in the wider area.
It's a good example of how the wider North Shropshire farming landscape can provide a varied succession of forage for honey bees through the season.
As with Myddle and Shotatton, Lyneal honey is harvested and kept separately, so each batch reflects the particular conditions and forage around the apiary at the time.