By Pat Brannan
Special to The Insider
The new motion picture, “The Rivals of Amziah King,” starring Mathew McConaughey, is shining a spotlight on beekeepers. We welcome the media attention and are using it as an opportunity to educate people about honey bees.
Although the movie may be more dramatic than accurate, beekeepers have their own share of drama, legend and lore. And, if there is one thing a beekeeper loves to do, it’s talk about their bees.
The phenomenon of purple honey is found predominately in the Sandhills. The taste of the purple is lighter, sweeter and has a fruity taste to most palates.
It weighs less than traditional honey and appears in the hive only during dearth conditions, when flowering plants produce little to no nectar or pollen. The color is darker than purple to my eyes. My husband says it looks like the color of motor oil. But when you first see it in the hive, it has an unmistakably purple hue.
There are probably as many theories about the source of purple honey as there are beekeepers. Some sources claimed to make the purple magic are Kudzu, blueberries, huckleberries, gall berry and elderberry. Most of these have been discounted as the actual nectar source.
A 2024 peer-reviewed study published in the journal “Palynology” was written by several scientists from universities across the country. A sample of North Carolina purple honey was analyzed under a microscope. The analysis found zero kudzu pollen, thereby eliminating the Kudzu plant as a source.
The late North Carolina State University professor and beekeeper John Ambrose taught beekeeping classes for 40 years and studied the theory about berries. He found that honeybees did not have strong enough mandibles to pierce the skin of berries that have the blue/purple hue, so berries were eliminated as a source.
However, Ambrose did propose the first scientific theory regarding the origins of purple honey. He performed bee “autopsies” to look at the digestive tracts of foraging bees as they came back to the hive with nectar. The dissections showed that the color change happens after the nectar is brought back and processed inside the hive, rather than in the honey bee’s gut when it leaves the flower. This suggests that digestive enzymes may play a part in the color change.
A more recent feasible theory for the purple honey source is either sourwood and/or wild grapes. The same peer-reviewed study that found no kudzu pollen in the purple did find significant amounts of sourwood pollen and a small amount of wild muscadine grape pollen. Sourwood trees flower during dearth season in July and August, but grapes usually flower from May to June.
At this intersection, science meets folklore head-on. The article published in the “Palynology”journal eliminated the common nectar/pollen sources of purple honey; however, Sourwood pollen was visible in the honey at an amount of 19 percent, making it the most abundant pollen source.
The soil in the Sandhills area of North Carolina is mostly acidic and rich in aluminum. The current prevailing theory of the purple color is the combination of the sourwood tree with this region’s aluminum soil content.
Experiments published in the “Journal of Chemical Education” proved that purple color can be developed by adding aluminum ions with an acidic pH. Could this be the definitive answer to the color of purple honey? I think research needs to be continued, but this is an interesting theory.
When you keep honey bees, you never stop learning about these amazing little creatures. They do so much for us in the areas of pollination and providing us with healthy honey. The next time you see a honey bee, say thank you.
Purple honey can be purchased locally at both Burney Hardware locations (Seven Lakes and Aberdeen) and Blush Salon in Seven Lakes. But hurry, the inventory is limited.
If anyone would like to see more articles about honey bees, contact Pat Brannan at brannan2@windstream.net with topics.
Pat Brannan has been a beekeeper since 2015. She currently has a journeyman classification and is a master bee keeper candidate.
