Our Philosophy

• Ethical Beekeeping

• Organic Apiculture

• “Bees Know Best”

• Purebred Buckfast Honeybees

• Raw & Unpasteurized Honey

• Minimally Filtered Honey

• Certified Organic Untreated Seeds

• Planting a Pollinator Friendly Garden

• Support Your Local Beekeeper

Most commercial beekeepers harvest 100% of honey and leave their honeybees with nothing but sugar syrup to eat throughout the Winter which is not sustainable. Although sugar does provide honeybees with energy it doesn’t give honeybees the nutrients they need to stay healthy. At Heiwa Honey we leave two deep brood boxes full of honey for each beehive, which is equivalent to approximately 20 frames of honey or 100 lbs. of honey per beehive. Anything our honeybees produce in excess of 100 lbs. we harvest, ensuring that our honey bees stay as healthy and happy as possible. We believe this to be the most ethical and sustainable way to tend to honeybees, with the health and happiness at the forefront.

We follow organic apiculture practices, which means we minimize our intervention with our beehives and refrain from using synthetic substances such as antibiotics or pesticides. We also follow the practices governed by the Canadian Organic Standards and adhere to the same Permitted Substances List as certified organic beekeepers. The main difference between our honey and honey which is certified organic is that Heiwa Honey is located in the City of Toronto and therefore we cannot guarantee that the 3 km. radius surrounding our apiary is free of prohibited substances such as pesticides. However, since the City of Toronto has banned pesticide use since 2009 we feel that our bees are foraging in a safe and clean environment.

At Heiwa Honey, we believe that, “bees know best”. Since honey is intended as the sole food source for honeybees throughout the Winter when they cannot forage, the shelf life of honey is imperative to their survival. Because of this, honeybees have developed a natural process of evaporating excess moisture by fanning the nectar they gather with their wings until it has reached exactly 18% water content. The ability for honeybees to measure water content without using a refractometer remains a mystery but it is an example of why we put our faith in honeybees. This philosophy allows our honeybees to live peacefully, in harmony with nature and their urban surroundings.

Since our apiary is in an urban centre, in close proximity to people, it's important that or honeybees are gentle natured. Because of this, we’ve sourced a strain of purebred Buckfast honeybees, which are bred for calmness, non-aggressive behaviour and a low tendency to swarm. Since these qualities are passed down through male genes, our queens are bred in a closed environment, on Georgina Island in Lake Simcoe. Our breeders are members of the Ontario Resistant Honeybee Selection Program and are evaluated for these traits annually by the Ontario Beekeepers’ Association Technology Transfer Program. Since our honeybees are gentle and calm, Heiwa Honey happily gives tours of our apiary by request, sharing our passion for honeybees with our community.

Unless honey is labeled as raw or unpasteurized it has likely been heated to a very high temperature, allowing it to be finely filtered, which removes any beeswax or pollen which naturally exist in honey. Since pasteurized honey no longer contains beeswax, propolis or pollen, it remains liquid and will not crystallize over time. Pasteurization also kills the good bacteria and health benefits associated with honey. Heiwa Honey is raw and unpasteurized, amplifying the antioxidants and health benefits of our honey. If you haven’t tasted Raw Unpasteurized Honey you’re definitely been missing out!

Since Heiwa Honey is only minimally filtered, containing a higher content of beeswax and pollen. These small particles of beeswax, propolis and pollen naturally exist in honey and heighten the aroma and flavour of our honey. However, over time these small particles may cause our honey to crystallize. If crystallization occurs we don’t recommend heating the honey to make it pourable again, as the honey will no longer be raw and the antioxidants and health benefits will no longer remain. If our honey crystallizes overtime, we suggest spreading it with a butter knife and enjoying its natural texture.

All pollinators, including honeybees, gather pollen and nectar from surrounding flora and fauna for food. If that food source is genetically modified, coated with fungicides, treated with pesticides or implanted with neonicotinoid insecticides, it can have life threatening consequences for pollinators. If you want to help pollinators by planting a pollinator garden, it’s imperative to source certified organic untreated seeds that have never been genetically modified. All of the Certified Organic Pollinator Seeds that we sell at Heiwa Honey have been certified by credible governing agencies such as Ecocert Canada, PACS, Pro-Cert Organic and OTCO, ensuring your seeds are Organic, Non-GMO and develop into healthy plants to support the pollinators in your region. It’s also important that you maintain your pollinator garden in an organic fashion, without ever using fungicides, pesticides or artificial fertilizers.

To create the most attractive pollinator friendly garden it’s important to select a diverse range of flowers. Pollinators require a wide range of flowers to ensure they obtain the nutrients needed to stay healthy. Some pollinators are also specialists, meaning that they require specific host plants for food or nesting material. To ensure that you continue to attract pollinators to your garden throughout the season, it’s also important to select flowers that have a variety of bloom times. Ideallty you want to have continual blooms in your pollinator garden from the moment the snow begins to melt in the Early Spring to when the leaves start to fall in the Late Autumn. Diversity of bloom colour is also significant as certain species are more attracted to certain bloom colours. All of the Certified Organic Pollinator Seeds we sell at Heiwa Honey have been chosen specifically for pollinator gardens for certain reasons such as the diversity of pollinators they attract, the high sugar content of their nectar, their exceptionally long bloom time, their significance as a host plant or their unusually early or late bloom time, all of which attribute to a successful pollinator garden bustling with life. To ensure you don’t harm pollinators, refrain from using fungicides, pesticides or artificial fertilizers, ensuring your pollinator garden is bee safe.

Honeybees predominantly forage the flora and fauna within a 3 km. radius of their beehives. Because of this, the nectar and pollen they collect and make into honey is directly influenced by the local species that grow in that same region. The closer you live to this region, the more health benefits you’ll receive from the honey as you’re exposed to the same elements as not only the honeybees but the flora and fauna they forage. For example, if you get seasonal allergies in the Autumn from Goldenrod, which grows in your surrounding environment, you aren't going to receive the same health benefits from Manuka honey, which comes from New Zealand as you would from local honey which comes from your own city, like Heiwa Honey. This is why we encourage you to support your local beekeeper and try our Raw Unpasteurized Local Honey.