Honeyview Farms

Come to Limbert Mountain Farms where Honeyview will be their guest for the day of the Tour.  Taste their uniquely flavoured honey, see the construction of a beehive, try on a bee veil. Learn about the fascinating life of bees and try the delicious honey of Honeyview Farm.  More information is at http://www.honeyviewfarm.ca/ , email or phone (604) 794-3315

It is a great honor to have Honeyview farm participate in the Slow Food Cycle Tour of Agassiz as a guest of Limbert Mountain Farms.  Honeyview farm is the largest apiary in BC, with hives located in the Fraser Valley and Northern Alberta.  In total, they manage approximately 2500 hives and produce over 100,000 kg of honey each year. 

Their Fraser Valley farm, located in Rosedale, supplies an all-important service to the berry farms.  A lot of intensive work goes into making the bee colonies strong enough to pollinate the blueberry flowers which bloom early. Every available hive is moved into the berry fields at dusk and dawn after which they are moved to raspberry and cranberry fields. Good pollination ensures not only more berries but larger and well formed ones.  Pollination is so important to these crops that a cold spring, like the one we’ve had this year, affects the ability of the bees to pollinate and reduces the berry yield. 

A real challenge is the bears—once they taste the sweetness of honey it is almost impossible to deter them from destroying the hives.  Hives need to be protected by electric fencing as soon as they are placed in the field—so hopefully the bears don’t find out what a good thing is inside the hives.  Bears will tear through electric fencing or virtually any other type of barrier once they know the sweetness of the honey inside the hives, posing a big problem for beekeepers. 

Once the honey is collected, the honey is extracted from the hives at their farm location in Rosedale.  The extraction room is glassed in so visitors can observe this interesting process.  Some of the honey is sold in bulk to overseas markets (the blueberry honey is prized by the Japanese, for example).  In addition, they sell honey in jars at their farm and through some farm market outlets.  Honeyview farm adds a variety of unique flavors to their honey giving us espresso honey, cinnamon honey, raspberry honey, cranberry honey and more.