Is This Honey Safe To Eat?

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We, as honey bee removal and relocation professionals, are constantly asked if the honey we get from the hives we remove is safe to eat. My answer is typically something like this... "If I know the history of the hive and that no one has attempted to poison the bees then it is absolutely as safe as any honey you'll get from manged colonies in my opinion". Many times honey from healthy feral colonies is cleaner than honey from managed colonies, or at least the wax is, since there is no recycled wax in feral colonies. Recycled wax can contain trace levels of pesticides. Most managed colonies contain some amount of recycled wax in their foundations. Most managed hives are also chemically treated for pests and disease. These treatments are not typically done when a honey flow is on but there is sometimes overlap. These chemicals are also deemed safe for use inside a honey producing colony by the USDA. Of course they have to be used in accordance with proper procedures.
In regards to knowing if a hive has been poisoned, I can typically tell if pesticides have been used in or near a hive in the recent past. There are several tell tale signs. The truest test is when you explain to a property owner that the honey is safe to eat as long as no one has tried to poison the bees and then they still want the honey. At that point I know for sure that they haven't tried to kill them. Property owners don't always want all the honey even if they know for a fact no poison has been used on the bees. Some just don't like honey and some are unfamiliar with raw eating honey straight from a hive. They think it has to go through some kind of processing before it is safe to eat. Most of the time if they want any they just want a little bit of comb honey.
Honey bees are very hygienic. Even when you see a hive like this that has a dead rodent or lizard or bird near the hive there is no contamination from that in the honey or the wax. The bees have sealed that off with propolis and they don't track through the area of that carcass to enter the hive so don't be scared to eat that dead rat honey. wink wink
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