The Sound of Rain and Bees

Greetings Emma,

As another eventful and tumultuous year comes to an end, we hope that your loved ones are safe amidst the flooding and you are busy preparing for the holiday season.

In the interest of saving some of your precious pre-Christmas time, we will keep this month's edition short and sweet.

In product news, for the first time ever, we are offering select 500g Two Packs with attractive gift sleeves - the perfect gift for honey lovers.

We also have gift sleeves available for select 200g mixed four packs to make a beautiful gift or tasting pack - just in time for Christmas!

In addition, we have had some more coverage in the media, we will share deadlines for ordering prior to Christmas, and Tim will continue to update you on his beekeeping adventures.

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New Gift Range

Select Combinations of our Wild Honeys

We are very excited to announce the release of our new Wild Honey Gift range.

Creating a gift range has been a long term dream for us, so to finally see it happen, and to do so by working in person with our amazing, local printery, is gratifying.

Sporting elegant cardboard sleeves around sturdy packaging, our 500g and 200g gift packs of Wild Honey make a wonderful gift for the honey connoisseur.

We are also offering a number of our 200g varieties in mixed four jar gift packs as well - perfect as tasting/sample packs or an elegant gift for the most discerning foodie!

Printed on attractive recycled cardboard, and fitting snugly around our existing packaging, the sleeves make the gift of our rare and award winning Wild Honeys that much more special.

When we started on our journey with Warré hives and Natural beekeeping way back in 2009, we never got ahead of ourselves with dreams of selling honey. Our focus was on the health of the bees and creating a sustainable, ethical model for beekeeping.

It’s been a long and challenging journey, so to be at the point where we can now offer multiple varieties of high quality honey from these special hives, whilst still increasing the strength and resilience of the bee colonies, is rewarding. We hope you enjoy these offerings, which are the product of that decades long journey.

Share some sweetness this festive season!

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A Buzz in the Air

Last season Ben from Leap Films came out for a few days to document our work in the apiaries. It was a pleasure hosting him, and we hope to do a lot more work together in the future.

It's a pity that the weather has been so poor this spring, and not really conducive to beekeeping or filming, but we did gain a little time to put together a short vignette of what was captured last season in the lower mountains. We hope you enjoy it!

Thanks very much to Ben for coming out and spending some time with us in the apiaries.

As mentioned in our last newsletter, we are honoured to be included in the very first issue of Swill Mag (by Swill House, responsible for Restaurant Hubert, Alberto’s Lounge et al).

Tim had a wonderful time hosting journalist David Matthews and photographer Ellen Virgona at one of our upper mountain apiaries discussing our approach to, and love for, natural beekeeping. You can purchase a copy online or you can read the section featuring Tim on our website.

Last week we were delighted to find the interview, conducted by Broadsheet with Tim, was published in their online newspaper as part of the Sydney Pantry section.

Sydney Pantry is a series celebrating ingredients made by Sydney’s greatest producers that have gone from cult classics to kitchen staples.

We are most appreciative to Aimee for taking the time to really dig into what we do with Tim, and for the attention of one of Sydney's most popular online publications. Thankyou Broadsheet!

You can read the full article here

For more information on Tim Malfroy and Malfroy's Gold in the public eye, visit our Social, Awards, Blogs and Media pages (the latter also includes recipes from some of Australia's finest chefs who champion our produce!)

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The Sweetest Gifts

Product News

The continuing wet weather and flooding has made honey production almost impossible this spring, delaying harvests by at least 8 weeks to date.

As a result, we are now temporarily out of stock of Wild honeycomb and some Wild Honey varieties and sizes, but most should be back early in the new year if the heavens will close for a few weeks here and there!

The Wild Honeys we do have on offer leading up to Christmas are limited in number so you will need to get in fast to avoid missing out!

In addition to the new Wild Honey Gift Packs, we still have a few 1k Beeswax Blocks in stock (for a limited time).

Our existing Mixed Wild Honey Four Packs are still available for those who prefer to buy in larger quantities at a reduced price.

As always we have E-Gift vouchers available for a convenient way to send those last minute gifts this festive season.

Shipping

It can take us up to a week to process orders as everything is done in house, from the production of the goods all the way through to the packaging and posting of your order.

We generally allow another week for goods to be delivered as we live in Regional Australia.

To guarantee delivery by Christmas we advise you to place your orders by the end of November as Australia Post has advised there may be delays in delivering goods during this peak period.

Our online store will be open over the Christmas break, however, we won't be posting orders out between the 19th December and 3rd January.

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This Month's Select Products

* Please note we are bound by Australian Biosecurity regulations so are not permitted to send honey to TAS, NT or WA

Social Insects

Tim's Warré beekeeping adventures in the Blue Mountains and Central Tablelands

Carrying on from the last newsletter, where we reported a delay to spring flowering due to the persistently rainy, cool weather, I’m afraid to say that it’s been more of the same. We even had a dusting of snow, with temperatures dropping down to minus 7°C windchill - not ideal for the bees or the beekeeper!

In between the snow storms and cool rainy weather, we’ve managed to fit in some beekeeping work, and are pleased to report that despite the extremely poor conditions, the colonies are holding up well. It’s been extraordinary to observe the population dynamics of the colonies, held in a kind of weather-induced ’slo-mo’, with colony sizes similar to what we would normally find in August or September. The rainy weather washes the nectar from the flower, and cool temperatures result in the bees having less flying time (foraging bees fly only above 8°C and prefer warm to hot sunny weather), meaning that the colony can lose momentum at this critical time of year.

Thankfully, the last few days have been warm and dry and the bees are already making progress. Some of the spring brood we’re seeing is extraordinarily healthy, with no sign of disease in the apiaries. Cool, wet springs can often lead to outbreaks of fungal or viral diseases in bees, but so far all the apiaries are fighting fit.

To have come through the wettest year on record with minimal losses is another positive sign that the Warré hive design and natural beekeeping principles are helping buffer the colonies against climate extremes and external pressures.

It has been interesting to see the environment in the Blue Mountains respond to the extreme wet weather, particularly which species have germinated after the bushfires. Many of the more delicate ground flora species in the upper mountains have come into flower across the sodden heath, giving the dramatic landscape little pops of colour. The Eucalypts are using the conditions to put their energies into regrowing their canopies. The fresh young leaves, which are a bright red colour, seem to elevate the otherwise moody ambience. Also bright red is the striking flower of the endemic Waratah, and this spring has seen the largest flowering I can remember. All these changes put a little spring in my step as I wait for the wet weather to clear.

Something else to be thankful for is the arrival of a beekeeping helper from distant lands. Uli from Berlin has come to volunteer this season, lending a crucial hand during the busy months. Uli has been here a couple of times before and is now an experienced natural beekeeper, with his own business doing well in Berlin supplying Warré hive honey to customers and fine restaurants. We’ve been lucky to have natural beekeeping helpers from many parts of the world - France, Germany, Czech Republic, Argentina, Estonia…and we love the camaraderie and long term friendships that are forged in the apiaries during these visits.

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Tim will continue to fill your feed with updates from the field about the ever changing and unique flora of the regions, bee biology, our wild honey produce and other interesting things - all bee related - follow along below!

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Thank you to everyone who contacted us or purchased items after reading our previous newsletter - your ongoing support of what we do is very much appreciated!

We hope you enjoyed our eighth newsletter and are always happy to hear your thoughts. (If you missed last month's newsletter and would like to read it you can do so here.)

Wishing you all the best during the pre-silly season madness,
Tim, Emma and the Daughters of Light