Black Butterfly Honey
About Our Apiary
In 2020, following our owner’s near-death experience with Covid, Nick decided to get back into beekeeping.
Nick grew up with bees while living in Western New York, and beekeeping was something he always wanted to get back into. Like with all things in life, Nick couldn’t find the time to do this.
After surviving Covid, he decided it was time to pull the trigger and get back into beekeeping. Nick reached out to area industry experts and started a new South Carolina honeybee apiary from scratch. The original apiary consisted of two packages of bees, which quickly blossomed into many more large hives with thousands of happy bees! Today, Nick spends his days loading, shooting, and checking on his apiary to provide you with the most delicious natural raw honey South Carolina can offer. Our 100% natural raw honey is produced and packaged accordingly to SC DHEC regulations here in South Carolina.
Black Butterfly Honey!
About our honey
Black Butterfly Honey is local wildflower honey that is collected from white holly, blackberry, and tulip poplar. The flavor depends on the Carolina wildflower blossoms and changes each year. This bright golden dark honey is rich and luxurious. The honey has a very high sugar content and goes great with hot drinks, over yogurt or as a replacement for granulated sugar cane.
What is raw honey?
Raw honey comes straight from the honeycomb. It is filtered to remove large pieces of debris, such as chunks of pollen and beeswax. The honey is not pasteurized, meaning it retains all its natural antioxidants and nutrients. The exposure to high heat during the pasteurization process may destroy the honey’s natural properties, which means that raw honey may offer more health benefits, in terms of healing wounds and fighting infections, than regular honey.
Raw honey contains specific components that can offer health benefits. Pasteurization may remove or reduce some of these elements, which include the following:
- Bee pollen which has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties.
- Bee propolis, a glue-like substance that helps keep the hive together which is rich in phenolic acids, flavoniods, eters, diterpenes, sesquiterpenes, lignans, aromatic aldehydes, alcohols, amino acids, fatty acids, vitamins and minerals.
- Certain vitamins and minerals
- Enzymes
- Amino Acids
- Antioxidants
Honeybee Nucs
In addition to raw natural South Carolina Honey, we also offer Honebee Nucs by special order for those folks who would like to start their own colony. Nucs are available by preorder basis only during the spring and through the end of June each year. See our nuc sales page for more information.
What is a bee nuc?
A bee “nuc” is a nucleus colony referring to a small hive in which a colony of bees reside, but it can also describe the small colony of bees itself. It is one of the easiest ways for beekeepers to start a colony in a new hive. Frames of comb can be removed from an established hive. Since they come from an already successful colony, they contain a comb with a developing brood at several stages of development. A bee nuc usually includes four to five frames of comb that also contain cells with honey and pollen stored by the original colony. This way of starting a hive has the distinct advantage of a good population of adult workers that are ready to start foraging and building a foundation in the new hive.
Certified South Carolina
Grown Honey
To be eligible to use the Certified South Carolina Grown logo, producers must supply a complete list of all products they grow in South Carolina and wish to list as Certified SC Grown. In addition, members must agree that the SC Grown logo will only be used on first-quality products that are grown in South Carolina and meet the US #1 Quality Grade Standard, or higher US Grade Standards, whichever is the accepted USDA industry grade standard for that commodity. The logo is not to be used on secondary labels or cull products.