blackberry honey

[drew]

Someone who knows please let me now the answer to this.

Every time I see blackberry honey in the store or a farmers market etc.. it is kinda dark in color.

My question the honey that I have put up which I would label as blackberry honey is alot lighter in color. Is this what blackberry honey should look like.

One thing, I go so far as to take off all the supers with the spring honey and put fresh supers on to keep the blackberry honey seperate.

There is nothing grown in my area other then wild blackberries and grapes. So I am very sure this light honey is from the blackberries.

SO IS BLACKBERRY HONEY LIGHT IN COLOR?

[Robert]

Drew
I would be asking myself is the Honey you see for sale that is darker in color,
Is it from a small BeeKeeper ?,
Or large oreration ?
,Did he heat the honey to pump it ? ,
Did the BeeKeeper extract all his honey together ?,
or did he Extract his diffent kinds of Honey apart from each other ?
And did he clean his extractor after doing so ?
Or you may ask Did he change out His supers when he moved to Blackberry ?
I would go as far as saying Your Blackberry Honey Is pure Blackberry Honey.
Since you know what you have done to make sure the supers were changed out,
Go one step farther and clean your extractor between diffent types then you know
In your heart that your Honey is truely Pure BlackBerry Honey and is also The best in the State,
and Put that on your label
It may have not won any ribbons Like Others have,
but whos to tell you that its not the Best in the state(thay dont have your tastebuds.)

[Todd Balsiger]

Drew, I think you answered the question yourself by stating the only floral source was blackberries at your location.

This is an issue which I got an answer to about a year ago. Many beekeepers have a convention of labelling light honey as clover, and darker as blackberry. This convention is a source of irritation for one beekeeper I know, for like you, he's floral source is limited to blackberries. He's blackberry honey is light. I beleive blackberry honey is light.

You can have mostly pure blackberry honey and have one floral source that will darken it up significantly. So I don't think it's wrong to label darker honey as blackberry either.

[NormCounterman]

Straight Blackberry honey is very light, as Todd said.
But can anyone of us not take a walk when we have a raging blackberry flow in progress and find our bees working on all of the other stuff as well.
Robert has the right attitude; Assess the flow to the best of your ability, and label with a clear conscience.
Also, for you hawnyawks that don't use queen excluders; guess what?
Your honey will always be darker than mine.
So put that in your smoker and puff away...
Norm ;D