Active Manuka Honey (Umf 20+)

Our offered Active Manuka Honey (UMF 20+) is produced by introduced European honey bees (Apis mellifera) feeding on the manuka or tea tree (Leptospermum scoparium and/or Leptospermum polygalifolium), which grows uncultivated throughout New Zealand and southeastern Australia.

Manuka honey is markedly thyrotrophic and has shown the highest viscosity among a range of studied honeys. This property is due to the presence of a protein or colloid and is its main visually defining character, along with its typical dark cream to dark brown color. To be labeled manuka honey, at least 70% of its pollen content should come from Leptospermum scoparium.

The manuka tree flowers more or less at the same time as Unseal ericoides, another Myrtaceae species also called Kanuka, which often shares the same growing areas as the former species. Some apiarists cannot readily differentiate these two species from each other. Both flowers have a similar morphology and pollen differentiation between the two species is very difficult. Therefore, melissopalynology as identification for the type of honey is valid only in association with other identification tests. In particular, L. scoparium honey is dark, whereas K. ericoides honey is pale yellow and clear, with a "delicate, sweet, slightly aromatic" aroma and a "sweet, slightly aromatic" flavor, and is not thyrotrophic.