Current Tupelo Honey News

We are now shipping our Tupelo Honey to all 50 states, and international to most countries.

2009 Tupelo Honey Harvest

2009 was another good year for Tupelo Honey production.  We were blessed with a good rainy season during February, March, and into April.  Even though the rain did hamper our beekeeping management it was welcome.  We were so far behind on our normal rainfall, and our water table was very low.  We received enough rainfall to put us back into a normal weather cycle, but nowadays it's hard to know what normal weather is.  We received enough rain to fill up our rivers, flood the swamps, and then some.   Several of our Tupelo yards got flooded so we had to move the bees out to other temporary location's until the flood waters receded.  It was touch and go as to whether we could get the bees back to their Tupelo location's by the time the tree's began to bloom.  We always have a backup plan; we had enough Tupelo yards to place our bees on that didn't get flooded.  Even though they would have been over populated we would still have made a decent crop.  However that was not the case, all of our bees were placed back in the Tupelo locations in time for the Tupelo bloom.  Our Tupelo trees had a beautiful bloom set and produced an abundance of nectar for our bees to collect.  Our volume of production was off just a little from the 109 drums produced in 2008.  The 2009 crop produced 95 drums.  The 2009 Tupelo Honey we produced was as good as the 2008 crop, and had all the classic characteristics Tupelo Honey should have.  Moisture around 16%, mild and pleasant flavor, light color with a greenish cast.  The test results from the 2009 samples sent into the Florida Department of Agriculture's Food Laboratory in Tallahassee, Florida are listed as follows:

Fructose/Glucose Ratio ---- 1.76
Fructose: HPLC -------------- 44.41%
Glucose: HPLC --------------- 25.30%
Maltose: HPLC --------------- 3.01%
Pollen Grains ---------------- 95.0% Tupelo
Sucrose ----------------------  0.92%

This is 100% pure honey and is as pure certified Tupelo Honey as you will ever find anywhere.  If you find any more pure than this, I would certainly like to have it myself.

Our bees worked very hard for long hours along the Chipola River to bring in some of the best Tupelo that can be had.   Thanks to Smiley Apiaries Honey Bee's we can have some fine Tupelo for another year.

To all of our customers, we at Smiley Apiaries extend our "SINCERE THANKS"!  Without you we could not exist.   So that said, we will continue to strive to bring you the absolute best Tupelo Honey that can possibly be produced anywhere.  If ever there is any problem or you have any question about our product please do not hesitate to call or email us with your questions or concerns.

Donald Smiley
Smiley Apiaries