Rising sales during Covid proves a sweetener for honey firm

Local farm sees boost in sales because of respiratory properties in product

Galtee Honey Farm has 170 hives of honey bees sited in groups called apiaries throughout a 25-mile radius within the Vee Valley.

Galtee Honey Farm is run by Micheál and Aoife Mac Giolla Codas on the edge of Glengarra Wood in the heart of the Galtee Vee Valley where the three counties of Cork, Limerick, and Tipperary meet.

The farm has 170 hives of honey bees sited in groups called apiaries throughout a 25-mile radius within the Valley and this ensures that the bees are collecting honey from a wide variety of flora including sycamore and horse chestnut blossom, dandelion, oilseed rape, hawthorn, blackberry blossom, clover and heather.

In fact, it is these flowers that give Galtee Honey its complexity of flavour.

The Mac Giolla Codas’ are also committed to the promotion and conservation of the native honeybee of Ireland — Black Bee — and specialise in rearing and breeding the Black Queen Bee for beekeepers around the country.

Honey contains nutrients that are rich in antioxidants and is regarded as ‘less bad’ than sugar, especially for diabetics. 

Honey contains nutrients that are rich in antioxidants and is regarded as ‘less bad’ than sugar, especially for diabetics.

The antioxidants help lower blood pressure and improve cholesterol and have beneficial effects on heart health. It is also known for its ability to protect the respiratory system which is why honey sales increased in the aftermath of Covid-19 restrictions in April.

“Full-time honey farms are quite unique in Ireland because of the climate which is not very conducive to honey production,” Aoife told the Irish Examiner.

“When we get a good summer we could have a fantastic yield of honey but because the weather is so unpredictable, it can be quite difficult to achieve.” 

Meanwhile, a typical day at Galtee Honey Farm varies from season to season but no matter what happens, the welfare and management of the bees is the key component to manufacturing the best honey that is possible to make there.

“From April onwards we mark the Queen Bee and then as the swarming season comes into focus during the summer months we are able to control the bees and get the yields as high as we can,” continued Aoife.

“We have 20 sites on the farm with eight or 10 hives on each all within a 25-mile stretch; we visit each site, open the hives for inspection every nine or 10 days — if the Queen is preparing to leave we will then create a new colony from the original swarming bees and they in turn produce the honey in the summer.

“We don’t take all their honey because they use a lot of it themselves.” 

Breeding is also an important aspect to the workings of Galtee Honey Farm and particularly when it comes to the native Irish Black Bee - which is currently under threat.

“Ireland has the largest populations of the Bee in Europe and that is a very important aspect in the manufacture of Irish honey,” said Aoife.

“We are also breeding Queen bees to increase the number of colonies we have; bee keeping is a vocation it’s not just about honey production.

Our mission is to increase the colonies of honey bees here on the farm.

"We do that through the production of Queen bees and distributing them to beekeepers around the country and propagating that all important genetic resource as well.” 

Routes to market are local and mainly based in Tipperary, Limerick and Cork but the Mac Giolla Codas’ also supply speciality stores in Dublin and have moved into selling their honey online.

“Some of our honey goes to Dublin and we also sell our product in our online store — this has become so important to us now since the Covid-19 restrictions were introduced because we would have had people calling to the farm on a regular basis to buy the honey and they can’t do that anymore.

The online store allows us to sell our product directly to the customer.

“In fact I think the whole idea of a website and online shop is fantastic because the customer gets a much better experience of what the product they are buying is all about and where the ingredients for the food is coming from.

“We are developing food tourism workshops at the moment and they will be available to visitors in 2021; we are doing this in conjunction with the Tipperary Food Producers Network and are very excited about that.” 

Aoife also says that while the farm and honey production wasn’t badly affected by Covid-19 restrictions, the pandemic, nevertheless, did bring its challenges.

“We have been lucky that we haven’t been severely impacted by Covid-19; honey is known to be good for the respiratory system and in many cases sales of honey increased over the last seven months,” she said.

“Our bees also produce an Ivy honey and research carried out by Limerick Institute of Technology (LIT) has shown the honey has high levels of pathogens that help the respiratory system.

“We have seen an increase in Ivy honey sales because of this.”