HAPPY WORLD BEE DAY!! ‘Where would we be without the bees’ and all pollinators for that matter? People, plants, and the environment have so much to be grateful for among these hardest working creatures on the planet. From one flower to another, carrying pollen and empowering a production of enormous abundance of fruits, nuts, seeds and more as well as the cornucopia of flavor and variety that not only make better quality products, but gifting us all a better quality of life. How something so very, very small can make such a very big impact?! World Bee Day is a great day to remember that it is the smallest things that add up to make a BIGGEST difference each day.
TO CELEBRATE the BEE, we are launching the FIREFLY HONEY PRE-ORDERS for 2023. To be honest, we meant to do this earlier (closer to Earth Day), but Friends, it has been a doozy of a year already and it’s only May! Lot’s of wonderful things happening, just seemingly not enough hours in the day. You know what I mean? So let’s just cut to the chase: Friends, Pre-Orders are OPEN and we have a new product to share with you this season! Firefly’s 2023 Seasonal Honey Selection.
Most of you know, we’re not a huge operation producing thousands of pounds of honey. Instead, we focus on pure, high-quality, raw varietal honey. It’s a quality vs. quantity proposition, and we choose to focus on EXCEPTIONAL QUALITY over excessive quantity. Last year we produced 900 pounds, and we sold out of all our raw honey earlier this year (for the third year in a row). People are often intrigued by the distinct colors and flavors of honey that those amazing honey bees can make from just a single farm!
Unique Honeys All from the Farm
Because we are a Certified Organic farm and focus on regenerative agricultural systems, we have a ton of habitat and forage for the honeybees to thrive on. This comes in the form of many cover crops, fence rows, and wild areas that create places for honeybees to forage, travel, and socialize. Simply put, our farm provides a foundation for honeybees to be safe, healthy, and productive. That gives our farm the Bee Friendly Certified distinction, and the bonus is that we never have to move our honeybees off the farm to find varietal flavors!
We truly pride ourselves on capturing specific moments and flavors in time when we bottle our honey. Commercial honey operations might extract and bottle their honey during a single push, which results in a single type of honey that is just a big mashup of honey from nectar sources throughout the year. We feel this is a little like getting a book with only the last chapter in it…you know how it ends but you cannot shake the feeling that there is a whole lot of the story that you missed. Firefly Fields is here to fill in the gaps.
By collecting honey at a higher frequency throughout the year, we can identify what blooms bees were foraging on leading up to and through different micro-flows during the season. This has a couple of major benefits.
First, by collecting honey during specific micro-flows, we can produce a varietal honey that is pure and reflects a specific taste from the farm. You like that sweet clover honey with an apple-pie flavor on your tongue? Or maybe you are a buckwheat honey lover, chasing that rich malty and earthy taste? You can bet honey from Firefly Fields is going to deliver big on flavor.
The second benefit of high-frequency collection is that this provides a wealth of information and opportunity to monitor the hive throughout the year. It is undeniable that honeybees today face a gauntlet of trials and tribulations. Good beekeepers think first about the health of their hives, honey is just an added benefit. High-frequency collection allows us to monitor for any changes in the hive and document how colonies are responding to conditions throughout the year.
Tracking foraging patterns, monitoring hives, bottling honey during micro-flows, and grading out honey varietal flavors requires a lot of time and attention. Our process makes us kind of niche, but we believe this is something where you get out what you put in. We put in a lot of extra effort, but once you have tried our honey there is no denying that our honey is extra special.
PRE-ORDER 2023 Firefly Honey
New Product! 2023 Seasonal Honey Selection
For the first time, we are offering Firefly Honey Lovers the option to pre-order a ‘taste of the landscape‘ in three or five honey jars! NOTE: the Seasonal Selection will not be ready until September, as we will collect three to five varietals of honey from across time and space this season. All of our raw honey comes from bees in apiaries located on our family’s diversified organic farm in southwestern Michigan.
We’re excited to be one next step closer to our Firefly Honey CSA Dream! One day, we hope for you to be able to order a raw honey share each season that gives you a ‘taste (or tastes) of the month!’ We want you to enjoy it the way we do, fresh from the hive and in season with what is in bloom. There truly is something magical about walking into a bee yard in late August with an intoxicating smell of parmesan cheese and butterscotch paired with the sight of buzzing bright yellow pollen loads of goldenrod. You race to the hive and quickly (and gently) pull off the top cover. One cannot resist, you must stick your finger right into the bright yellow comb and taste what your seeing and smelling right in the moment. Ecstasy and harmony all at once.
If you are interested in ordering the 2023 Seasonal Honey Selection we have two options for you:
The three jar selection allows you to select from ALL three honey jar sizes we offer 1/5 L, 1/2 L, and 1 L. You will receive honey from three different moments across the 2023 honey season.
The five jar selection allows you to select from either 1/5 L or 1/2 L size jars. You will receive your honey from five different moments across the 2023 honey season.
Seasonal Honey Selection orders are expected for delivery or pick-up in September. These will be in only limited supply and by pre-order only. We hope you consider the Seasonal Honey Selection this year!
Can’t Wait Until September?
We don’t blame you! We have a couple quick fixes for you.
Based on the conditions in the hive as well as the weather, we expect the first round of Firefly Honey to be ready around mid-July. Simply, pre-order your favorite raw honey in 1, 1/2, or 1/5 Liter jars and as soon as the bees provide for your order with the first honey harvests, you will receive your honey.
You Want Honey Now!
We have a limited supply of premium 2022 bee butter, comb honey, and Queen Bee’s Stash Honey Samplers. These will not last long, but are sure to satisfy your Firefly Honey fix until 2023 raw honey is available!
Now Offering Pick-up Options (May-October)
For those of you that have wanted to visit the farm or pick-up on an alternative day (not Saturday), we are offering a local pickup in Nashville and Delton with online orders now through October. We hope this option provides another flexible way to get you what you need that honors the time we need to be on the farm, while also giving you an opportunity to see some of the operation in action. To pick-up at the farm, order online and select the pick-up option on the drop-down menu. Ben or I will follow-up with an email and arrange a date and time that works for all.
For our Kalamazoo and Lansing Area customers, WE WILL COME TO YOU! A few years ago, Farmers Market Managers started encouraging the use of pre-orders ahead of the Saturday markets to alleviate traffic flows and offer a convenient option to eaters, especially during social distancing. Texas Township customers will have the option to order ahead of Saturday markets by ordering online and then picking-up during markets on the last Saturday market of the month (see Firefly’s 2023 Farmers Market Schedule).
MERIDIAN TOWNSHIP – we’re so sorry to miss you for the market days this summer. We are SO BUMMED, truly. But, to try and make up for it, we’re going to experiment with a TBD pick-up once a month. Similar to farm pick-up, order online and Ben or I will contact you to setup a pick-up time once per month in the Okemos Area. We may modify this as we go, for example, try to target a specific reoccurring date and time (e.g. Wednesday evenings at 7 p.m. or something TBD) during the summer that works for people. This allows us to get you what you need, while also allowing us to be present on the farm more.
Folks! We’re signing off with this adorable picture of my niece hobbit that couldn’t even wait for the honey to be capped. She was a very good honey helper out at the hives that day. The things you do for Love. <3
Brooklyn wants honey now! (She should have waited for it to be capped, IMHO.) 🙂
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