Types of Honey

Hello Gardeners, I’m Amanda McNulty with Clemson Extension and Making It Grow. The value of the European honey bee’s contribution towards pollination of crops in the US is estimated to be fifteen billion dollars. That doesn’t include the value of honey gathered and sold by bee keepers. There are two main types of honey – The first is poly or multi floral varieties that results from honey bees visiting whatever flowers in their neighborhood are in bloom. The second, which is what certain honey aficionados insist upon, is single flower honey, also called varietal, monofloral or unifloral, think sourwood or tupelo honey. The cost reflects the difficulty of producing it. The desired plant must be the dominant species in an area where bees are working and bee keepers must time the movement of bees in and out of the area to coincide with the time the plant begins and ends flowering.