Beekeeping
From establishing and managing your own apiary to harvesting and selling products.
Updated 18 April 2024
Harvesting & preparing products
Having tended to your beehives successfully, you can harvest a variety of produce from honey to other apiculture by-products. Different produce need specialist equipment for harvesting and are subject to specific regulations for sales.
Honey
Honey is legally classified as food. Therefore, in harvesting honey and preparing it for sale you will need to comply with food safety legislation throughout the process.
Harvesting & Processing
To harvest honey, you will need to decide what type of honey you will want to make. There is reserved terminology for each type, which you can check on gov.uk.
In Scotland, honey harvest typically happens in three flushes: spring, summer, and heather honey. When harvesting, you need to ensure that the bees are left enough stocks or given feed afterwards (see ‘Feeding bees’).
To process honey, you will need equipment including a honey extractor, filter, and tanks. You should also keep records when you harvest honey and keep containers clearly labelled.
To be sold as honey, your produce will also need to comply with legal specifications around colour, consistency, and aroma. You can check the criteria on gov.uk, and you might need to do some testing on the honey to ensure compliance.
Find out more:
- For a simplified explainer of the legal requirements around honey, see ‘The Honey Regulations (Scotland) 2015’ on the Aberdeen and District Beekeepers’ Association
- Northumbrian Bees have a blog series on hygienic harvesting and processing of honey on small scale.
- Harvesting and processing honey, the Scottish Beekeepers’ Association
- ‘Harvesting the crop’, Somerset Beekeepers Association
Packaging
Honey is typically packaged in a variety of jars, and you will need to ensure that the jars are sterile and made from material that is approved for contact with food. The legislation about approved materials can be found here.
No addition of other ingredients into honey is permitted. You will also need commercial scales to weigh your produce and comply with legal rules around packing and weight of the produce. Jars must contain at least the quantity of honey displayed on the label.
Labelling
Honey jars will also need to be labelled properly to ensure that customers are being given correct information about the product. This is a legal requirement and you are liable for false claims.
The correct terminology for your honey will depend on its source, the way it was extracted, and the way it is presented. Read the Honey (Scotland) Regulations 2015 and the Food Labelling Regulations 1996 for the reserved descriptions for each type of honey, and what information you must and are not allowed to include in labels.
You should be particularly careful about stating the source of honey (e.g., lavender honey) as this is difficult to establish.
Easter Ross Bees has a short explainer on labelling honey.
Beeswax
Harvesting & Processing
You will automatically harvest some beeswax are the by-product of honey processing. To prepare beeswax for sale, you will need to clean and shape it. Some equipment, such as a wax spinner, might be useful depending on your technique.
You can read more about wax harvest on the Somerset Beekeepers website.
Packaging & Labelling
Packaging regulations also apply to selling beeswax. Wax is not classified as food, so there is no specific information you need to include in labels but you are still legally liable for ensuring it is accurate. You can read more about general product labelling on gov.uk here.
Usage in other products
Selling beeswax in its pure form does not require any licences.
However, if you are planning to include it in cosmetics such as lip balm, you will need to comply with cosmetics regulations. These include recipe approval, testing, and creating documentation such as a Cosmetic Product Safety Report and Product Information Files.
To manufacture beeswax wraps, you need to comply with this food safety law. More information about making wraps is available on the Somerset Beekeepers Association website here.
Propolis, Royal Jelly, Pollen
In addition to honey and wax, you may choose to harvest propolis (produced by bees as a sealant in the hive), royal jelly (the specific food of larva and adult queens), and pollen (which bees gather as food in addition to honey).
There are specialist techniques and equipment for harvesting each of these products, for example, specific pollen gathering hive gates.
Propolis, royal jelly, and pollen are not classified as food but might be considered nutritional supplements or medicinal products depending on how you present them and market them.
Read more:
- The Food Supplements (Scotland) Regulations 2003
- ‘A guide to what is a medicinal product’, Medicines & Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency
Queens & Bees
You might also choose to sell additional queen bees or create nuclei for sale. To sell bees, you should be confident that they are disease and pest free, and that any frames and containers they are sold in are thoroughly sterilised before use (see the BeeBase guide here).
The buyer should also be given information about the queen’s heritage, and whether it has mated or not.
You should keep records of the movement of the bees, for which a template can be found here. Keep this record at least for two years.
Read more: