Thyme as a honey plant and thyme honey

Thyme honey plant is a very valuable plant for beekeeping, from which bees collect thyme honey. Thyme is grown as an essential oil plant, which is used in cooking, perfumery, and medicine.

Read to the end - it will be interesting!

 

Content

• Description of the honey plant thyme
• Where thyme grows like a honey plant
• Thyme as a honey plant
• When thyme blooms like a honey plant
• Thyme honey productivity
• thyme honey
• Honey plant thyme in cooking
• Thyme honey plant in medicine

 

 

 

Description of the honey plant thyme

The honey plant thyme (Latin name Thymus vulgaris L.) is a semi-shrub, about 30 cm high.

Thyme root is taproot and branched.
The thyme stem is erect or ascending, which is lignified in the lower part and strongly branched.

Thyme branches are herbaceous, tetrahedral, grayish-pubescent, lateral shoots are shortened.
Thyme leaves are small (5-10 mm long), dark green in color, the leaves are short-petiolate, opposite, oblong-lanceolate, the edges of the leaves are entire and bent down, punctate-glandular.
Thyme flowers are five-membered, small, two-lipped, flowers are collected in whorls and semi-whorls located in the leaf axils. The calyx is green, the corolla is light purple, rarely white.
The thyme fruit is the coenobium, which consists of four nuts that are enclosed in the remaining calyx. Thyme nuts are 0.7-0.9 mm long, almost rounded, grayish or brownish-brown in color.

Where thyme grows like a honey plant

Where does thyme grow as a honey plant so valuable for bees? Thyme honey plant is native to the Mediterranean. Therefore, thyme as a honey plant is a common plant in the northwestern part of the Mediterranean coast, on the islands, in Spain, and also in the south of France.

In Russia, thyme is grown in the Krasnodar Territory, the essential oil plant thyme as a honey plant grows in the Crimea in the south of Ukraine, in Moldova, in the countries of the Balkan Peninsula - Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Turkey, Greece.

It is in these regions that beekeepers can get real thyme honey, which has been known since antiquity.

Thyme as a honey plant

Thyme as a honey plant is an excellent plant, the qualities of which should be considered in more detail.

When thyme blooms like a honey plant

When does thyme bloom like a honey plant? Depending on the region, thyme blooms in May - July.

In Poland, thyme blooms as a honey plant from June 10 to July 25, while the bees collect little pollen.

In Greece, thyme blooms as a honey plant in June - July, at this time there is a lot of rain, which ensures a good honey collection from thyme.

 

Thyme honey productivity

How much honey can bees harvest from thyme per 1 hectare? The fragrant thyme honey plant is very well visited by bees to collect nectar and pollen. Thyme nectar is very fragrant. A hectare of continuous herbage gives thyme honey productivity of 140-180 kg of sugar.

Under the conditions of Poland, honey productivity is 100 - 200 kg per 1 hectare.

Benefits for thyme bees as a honey plant is also that bees willingly visit thyme to collect nectar even in dry years, when other honey plants stop producing nectar.

thyme honey

What kind of honey bees collect from thyme flowers. Thyme honey of excellent quality, known since ancient times, when thyme honey collected by bees was a tribute from the Mediterranean islands, which has an incomparable aroma and taste.

Thyme honey is a hit in the world market and is currently supplied by Spain, Greece, France.
Thyme honey sufficiently tones the bees and it is believed that the essential oils contained in it act as a preventive medicine for diseases of the bees.

Thyme honey is light brown to red in color. The aroma of thyme honey from France has a persistent scent of balsamic Mediterranean flora.

The taste of thyme honey, like the smell, is quite persistent.

In a liquid state, thyme honey is stored for up to two years without crystallizing. Crystallization occurs from medium to fine, the consistency is from homogeneous to pasty.

Thyme honey has strong antioxidant properties.

Honey plant thyme in cooking

In cooking, fragrant thyme honey plant is used in dried and fresh form. Thyme fragrant is a part of many combined spices. Fragrant thyme improves the aroma and taste of vegetable dishes. Pork, lamb, beef, fish, as well as first courses of peas, lentils and beans are seasoned with fragrant thyme.

 

Thyme honey plant in medicine

The leaves of the sweet thyme honey plant contain the essential oil thymol. In addition, mineral and tannins, oleic acid, organic pigments, etc. were found in the composition of fragrant thyme. Fragrant thyme has bactericidal properties.

Tinctures and decoctions of fragrant thyme help to calm the nerves, treat insomnia, relieve pain in case of neuralgia and sciatica, and provide significant assistance in gastrointestinal diseases such as dysbacteriosis, fermentopathy.