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BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. => Topic started by: bassman1977 on September 27, 2007, 04:20:57 pm

Title: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: bassman1977 on September 27, 2007, 04:20:57 pm
In my area, we have an abundance of goldenrod in the fall.  My established hives can easily yield an average  of 500 or more pounds of SURPLUS honey.  Personally, I can't stand the stuff.  It stinks and has too overpowering of a taste for my liking.  My wife's grandfather however LOVES IT! 

From what I have noticed the more I ask people about it, it seems to be you either love it or hate it.  I am curious as to what everyone here thinks. 

I allowed multiple votes per user in case anyone wants to ask someone else who has tried goldenrod honey, their opinion.

Thanks.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Scadsobees on September 27, 2007, 05:07:00 pm
I read somewhere that it is the best honey for mead. :-D...(don't ask me where, I don't rememeber)

I like the difference, my wife hates the smell.  But I don't get enough so the bees keep it.  In small amounts it gives a buttery/butterscotch smell to the rest of the honey.

Rick
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: bassman1977 on September 27, 2007, 05:12:44 pm
Quote
In small amounts it gives a buttery/butterscotch smell to the rest of the honey.

I totally agree.  In large amounts it makes a vomit smell.  MMMMMMM
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: BeeHopper on September 27, 2007, 05:16:55 pm
I have never tried it, ( I would like to  :-D) so I cannot comment. However, I can say that along the PA Turnpike from Philly to Pittsburgh, there are seas of Goldenrod, the bees in PA are lucky  :-D
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: fcderosa on September 27, 2007, 09:09:07 pm
I read somewhere that it is the best honey for mead. :-D...(don't ask me where, I don't rememeber)

I like the difference, my wife hates the smell.  But I don't get enough so the bees keep it.  In small amounts it gives a buttery/butterscotch smell to the rest of the honey.

Rick

ACTUALLY THE BEST FOR MEAD IS THISTLE HONEY. :-D
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Potlicker1 on September 27, 2007, 10:26:50 pm
Fourtunatly for me by the time the goldenrod blooms, Iv'e taken my honey and leave the goldenrod for them. There,s a boat-load of it around here too. Never had to harvest it.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Scadsobees on September 28, 2007, 09:21:16 am
Quote
I have never tried it, ( I would like to  grin) so I cannot comment.

Beehopper...if you have teenage boys, dig into a pile of their socks that have been there for at least 5 days.  Sniff deeply, this is the aroma of goldenrod honey.  I'd suggest licking the sock to get the flavor but I won't because it is making me gaggy :-X.  Just soak the sock in a jar of perfectly good honey and that is basically the same thing.  :roll:

Rick :-D

Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: BeeHopper on September 28, 2007, 10:54:01 am
Quote
I have never tried it, ( I would like to  grin) so I cannot comment.

Beehopper...if you have teenage boys, dig into a pile of their socks that have been there for at least 5 days.  Sniff deeply, this is the aroma of goldenrod honey.  I'd suggest licking the sock to get the flavor but I won't because it is making me gaggy :-X.  Just soak the sock in a jar of perfectly good honey and that is basically the same thing.  :roll:

Rick :-D



Wow, that bad, huh  :shock:
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: reinbeau on September 28, 2007, 01:44:54 pm
Absolutely not, goldenrod honey doesn't taste like it smells while they're making it.  It's fine!  As a matter of fact we're eating the goldenrod honey that was made late last year right now - I can't believe anyone thinks it tastes like it smells while they're fanning the nectar.... :?
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Scadsobees on September 28, 2007, 02:23:42 pm
Ok, so maybe I'm exaggerating a bit.... :-P
Mine smelled like it did while they were fanning, a sour smell that wasn't exactly honey-like.  It did retain some of the sock odor.  I felt obligated to explain why it smelled that way when I gave it away. YMMV, I think there is a whole range of flavors that can occur.

It was my first harvest, so made a big impression.  I'd probably enjoy it more now, but it still wasn't near so good as my spring or summer honey.  I would like to try a batch of mead on it, though.

I don't get much anymore, and leave it for them.

Rick
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: BMAC on September 28, 2007, 04:25:03 pm
Many of the folks I sell to like Goldenrod honey.  I have made several batches of Mead from it too.  I dont know if it is the best but the yeast rock out in it and it ferments to 1.000 or less in just a matter of a few days......  Unlike Clover honey I use.  Clover needs to be poked and prodded to attenuate down......
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Shawn on September 28, 2007, 07:58:51 pm
Great thread. I was thinking about planting the golden rod next year but you guys have changed my mine. Thanks for the warning.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Michael Bush on September 28, 2007, 08:21:04 pm
I love the taste, but the bees usually need it...
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: TwT on September 28, 2007, 08:22:36 pm
I have tried it and it wasn't to bad, but mostly I leave for the bee's winter stores.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Scadsobees on September 28, 2007, 11:06:05 pm
Quote
Great thread. I was thinking about planting the golden rod next year but you guys have changed my mine. Thanks for the warning.

Always good to have goldenrod around for fall stores.  Unless you have miles of goldenrod and good rains you won't get any surplus. 
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: reinbeau on September 29, 2007, 09:58:43 am
Quote
Great thread. I was thinking about planting the golden rod next year but you guys have changed my mine. Thanks for the warning.

Always good to have goldenrod around for fall stores.  Unless you have miles of goldenrod and good rains you won't get any surplus. 
Nevermind any surplus, you may not have enough honey for the bees over the winter.  Around here, with the drought we've had, the goldenrod and asters are probably the only honey they're going to make. 
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Michael Bush on September 29, 2007, 02:24:28 pm
>Thanks for the warning.

What warning?  Goldenrod, no matter what you think of the taste, is great bee food.  I happen to think it's great people food as well...
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Shawn on September 29, 2007, 07:11:43 pm
Here is SE Colorado there is a surplus of sunflowers that will be blooming from about mid july until the first freeze. Its Sept 29 and there are still hundreds of thousnads of sunflowers a couple blocks away. Granted we are not in a drought, jut came out of one, but there are so many hay fields around not to mention the melon fields if I need to move the hives. I am setting up the yard with respberrry plants, peech, apple, and cheery trees, and lots of different flowers I found at this site, http://www.dianeseeds.com/flowers/beneficial-insects.html. I found other sites that describe good lants. I also will be planting white dutch clover, sweet yellow clover and the red crimson clover. I did see the golden rod is a well liked plant for the bees and maybe some day Ill change my mine if I get to try some of the honey it makes
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: bassman1977 on September 30, 2007, 01:10:16 pm
Lots of interesting comments and so far, I am surprised at the results of the poll.  I polled a lot of others in my family yesterday and they all like it too.  Considering the more established hives always have enough of it for winter, then I will just continue harvesting it.  What can it hurt if people are going to use it.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Old Timer on September 30, 2007, 06:40:32 pm
>Thanks for the warning.

What warning?  Goldenrod, no matter what you think of the taste, is great bee food.  I happen to think it's great people food as well...

i like it just as well as any other honey, and i think it's the prettiest color too, i love that golden color it has.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: bassman1977 on October 01, 2007, 10:41:01 am
Bumping up.  I am hoping for more votes.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: bassman1977 on October 03, 2007, 06:28:55 pm
Another bump up for votes.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Old Timer on October 03, 2007, 06:39:25 pm
i like all honey :) especially the one i sit with on the porch swing
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Zoot on October 03, 2007, 11:45:05 pm
I know my bees forage on the abundant goldenrod around here judging by the smell but I swear I've hardly ever seen one do it. The blossoms are always covered with bumble bees, wasps, and misc small garden bees but rarely honeybees. They are much more visable on the wild asters and other assorted wild flowers.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Cindi on October 04, 2007, 11:12:12 am
Old Timer, what a sweet comment, and I picture you with your honey on the porch  :) :) :)  Have a wonderful day, greatest of life.  Cindi
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: bassman1977 on October 05, 2007, 10:57:26 am
Thanks for all the comments and votes.  I am really surprised by the results.  I extracted 2 mediums of goldenrod on Tuesday and I must say, even though the stink is over powering, it tastes a little bit better and is a little bit lighter in color than last year's goldenrod.  I wonder if there is some sort of wild flower mixed in with it.  Well, it'll make someone happy anyway.

Thanks again.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: buzzbee on October 06, 2007, 08:36:14 am
We have a lot of asters growing around here along with the goldenrod. It has made a dark but very tasty honey. Not qite as full flavored as goldenrod alone but delicious.I would rank the taste as flavorful as the locust honey.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: mark on October 06, 2007, 07:29:42 pm
the last batch of honey i pulled off had a nutty pungent flavor.  very strong and dark.  don't know if it was goldenrod or a blend of that and clethra, loostrife and who knows what else.  i did not like it.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Moonshae on October 06, 2007, 09:30:19 pm
I was feeding for a bit earlier, but my girls have a lot more honey packed away than I could have fed them in syrup. I'm guessing the balance is goldenrod, but I have no complaints; I stole a frame from a hive with >90 lbs honey, and it tastes just fine.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: reinbeau on October 07, 2007, 07:25:06 pm
the last batch of honey i pulled off had a nutty pungent flavor.  very strong and dark.  don't know if it was goldenrod or a blend of that and clethra, loostrife and who knows what else.  i did not like it.
Does Japanese bamboo (http://www.uri.edu/ce/factsheets/sheets/jbamboo.html) (Polygonum cuspidatum) grow anywhere near you?  It's an invasive weed around here, but as a member of the buckwheat family, it's a great bee plant - they love it, but I don't like the honey.  It's very dark and strong, almost mollassesy.  Blooms in late August.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Romahawk on October 07, 2007, 08:59:18 pm
Hmmm, wonder if it's the soil or the climate that makes the difference. Japanese Knotweed makes a lighter colored honey with a walnut flavored taste in this area. I  know a local commercial beek that sells all he can get to the Vietnamese community's from here to Boston. He says he wishes that he had all his yards in areas that are saturated with it, he claims he sells every last drop he gets. I haven't tasted it myself but that's his story and he's sticking to it....  :-D
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Zoot on October 07, 2007, 11:23:57 pm
Romahawk

Is that also known as mexican bamboo? How those 2 names could be associated with the same plant eludes me completely but I think they are the same. It's become one of the more common invasive plants around here, especially in the woods along some of the smaller creeks, etc. but I've never noticed bees foraging it. I'll pay closer attention now.
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Romahawk on October 07, 2007, 11:38:54 pm
Not sure if it's the same plant or not but I suspect it probably is. It grows along streams, lake banks, and roadsides and it chokes out any plant in it's path. Very difficult to get rid of once it is established. Here the blooms were gone a couple of weeks ago. The plants were loaded as they are every year with little white blossoms and the bees are all over it from start to finish of the blooming season .
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Cindi on October 08, 2007, 12:35:46 am
Ann, you call this plant Japanese Bamboo, Romanhawk calls it Japanese Knotweed.  I think they are the same plant?

I was looking around our vicinity, noticing the fall plants that the bees were highly attracted to.  I saw this enormous foliage plant growing everywhere around our countryside.  It looked like bamboo kind of, but I have never known the name of it.  Now I think it is the Japanese Bamboo, Knotweed.  I noticed the stalks of the plant resembled bamboo very closely.  These groves of shrubs were covered in bees, obviously they were deriving great goodness from it.  It was around the 9th of September or so, so this plant is obviously a great plant for the bees in fall.  I would not call it invasive, it seemed to grow in groves, everywhere, in sparsely wooded areas.  It was a thing of beauty, I did take pictures, in the hope that one day I could have a plant ident.  I think my wish has come true.  Have a wonderful day, beauty of a life that we live.  Cindi

(http://img130.imageshack.us/img130/4460/japaneseknotweed640x480gt4.jpg) (http://imageshack.us)

(http://img130.imageshack.us/img130/5809/japaneseknotweek2640x48hd1.jpg) (http://imageshack.us)
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: reinbeau on October 08, 2007, 08:43:29 am
Most definitely, Cindi, that's what it is.  Bamboo, knotweed, that's the problem with common names, which is why I will usually use the latin name (Polygonum cuspidatum), but then people think I'm trying to be high fallutin  :-P 

The Victorians brought that over as an ornamental.  Problem is it's horribly invasive, as some here have noted.  If you really want to get rid of it, you have to use the bad stuff, Round-up, applied as it flowers.  It'll take a few years of application to get rid of it.  You can't dig it, one little piece of root will resprout.

Here's an article that's closer to you're part of the world (http://tncweeds.ucdavis.edu/success/or002.html).  There's another, known as Giant Knotweed, (Polygonum sachalinense), that looks very similar but is huge!  Funny thing is, my mother has that one in her garden, and for us here in New England it's very well behaved - go figure!  :-P
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Cindi on October 08, 2007, 02:28:07 pm
Most definitely, Cindi, that's what it is.  Bamboo, knotweed, that's the problem with common names, which is why I will usually use the latin name (Polygonum cuspidatum), but then people think I'm trying to be high fallutin  :-P 

The Victorians brought that over as an ornamental.  Problem is it's horribly invasive, as some here have noted.  If you really want to get rid of it, you have to use the bad stuff, Round-up, applied as it flowers.  It'll take a few years of application to get rid of it.  You can't dig it, one little piece of root will resprout.

Here's an article that's closer to you're part of the world (http://tncweeds.ucdavis.edu/success/or002.html).  There's another, known as Giant Knotweed, (Polygonum sachalinense), that looks very similar but is huge!  Funny thing is, my mother has that one in her garden, and for us here in New England it's very well behaved - go figure!  :-P

Ann, good.  Invasive species.  Probably, sounds like it in a big way.  The groves of the knotweed that I see around my community appear to be well-behaved too, not to say that they won't spread, but we have such places where they can grow and grow.

I googled Polygonum sachalinense, sounds really nice, interesting reading, I copied something from the site:

"Beneficial: The rhizomes are mentioned as an herbal source for laxatives and diuretics (Inoue et al. 1992). The young shoots are edible, if not eaten excessively, and taste somewhat like rhubarb (Pojar and MacKinnon 1994). Introduced as a garden ornamental, it is considered overly aggressive. (Seiger 1995; Hitchcock and Cronquist 1973; Hitchcock et al 1964; Pridham and Bing 1975)."

I do not have any issues with propogating the knotweed on my property.  Another lady that I know in Langely said that she has had a small gove growing for about 20 years beside her garage and it has not spread, she is aware of the invasiveness of this species.  I am heading off to the top of our road soon to dig up a little bit of the root, then I can have this fall plant for my bees.  I see it can grow to 10 feet or so from a few single little root cuttings, hmmm.....I will keep an eye on it.

I have Comfrey growing here like a mad man.  When we first moved in over 17 years ago, comfrey was so deeply overgrown here, one could barely walk.  I irradicated most of it, leaving only a big clump, which I contain quite nicely.  Except, where I dig out the roots to keep it controlled, is now a comfrey patch gone wild, it is in my "unwanted" compost pile, where I throw all the weeds.  Hmmmm.....it is good, it can grow to its heart content there, it is excellent for the bumblebees, the honeybees pay no mind, so I let it grow...and grow....and grow.

I would love the have the Giant Knotweed that your Mother has growing at her place, I looked at some sites and they are beautiful.  She is a lucky woman (or is she????, maybe she doesn't want this species  :) ;) :(

A plant that I tried to get hold of this spring, ordering through my local nursery, but never did obtain is the Giant Fleeceflower, "Persicaria polymorpha', google that one, it is beautiful too, sounds like it is a good bee plant as well.  Well, gotta run, the sun is shinin', I have one more colony to ready for winter, it still has the 3rd super on and I know it has to be off and the boxes set up  :) ;).  I want to take some pictures of stuff too, so today is gonna be a busy day in the sun, fun, fun, fun!!!  Best of this great life we're livin'.  Cindi
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: reinbeau on October 08, 2007, 05:34:41 pm
Persicaria polymorpha - that's the one my mother has!  And it is a wonderful bee plant.  I'll have to take a picture of it next year, it is downhill from the hives and the girls were all over it a month or so ago!  The herbal uses of Polygonum sachalinense need further study, thanx for the head's up!  :)
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: mark on October 08, 2007, 10:46:45 pm
knotweed huh.   yea we have lots of it here and that would explain the honey. thanks.          usda lists it as invasive and advises against planting it so also does nature conservancy.  visit www.invasive.org and plants.usda.gov for more info
Title: Re: Question on Goldenrod Honey
Post by: Cindi on October 09, 2007, 01:11:40 am
Mark, yes, these facts are understandable.  Noxious weeds I believe many of them are called. Too bad, but they can become so invasive that they are problematic.

So, Ann, Persicaria Polymorpha (Giant Fleeceflower) is the one your Mother has, yeah, that is good.  I know that I am going to try again this year to obtain seeds, roots, rhizomes, whatever to propogate this on my property.  It is a gorgeous flowering plant.

I have some exotic seed catalogues, I will examine them when they begin to come in.  Have a wonderful and greatest of this night and day, beautiful life.  Cindi