By Shelby Shank
Field Editor
Summer memories are full of honey and savored by Blake Butler.
His passion for beekeeping started in high school when he began working at Walker Honey Farm during the summers.
“I started helping in the summers when I was 15 and all throughout college. I did my own thing after college, but the smell of honey became so ingrained in me, I came back,” Butler said. “I never stopped keeping bees while I was away. The farm was in my blood.”
When an opportunity came up for Butler to come back to Walker Honey Farm, he took it.
Butler now oversees the bees and honey production as the chief operating officer, while maintaining the history and traditions of beekeeping.
Bee-ginning a legacy
Walker Honey Farm started buzzing in 1930 when G.C. Walker Sr. took a chance during the Great Depression and bought honeybees.
After his grocery business went under, honeybees seemed like a safe gamble.
Walker Sr. started with 150 hives, not knowing what he built would not only grow in size but be passed down generations.
G.C. Walker Jr. followed his father’s footsteps and expanded the business, introducing more hives.
In 2014, third generation beekeeper, Clint Walker, constructed a retail store and production facility in Rogers for Walker Honey Farm to store and sell its honey.
“Local honey is one of our bread and butters,” Butler said. “We have peanut butter and honeys where we whip in freeze dried fruit for different flavors.”
Their products range from local honey, bees wax, candles, soap and other unique items.
They also make their own mead using fermented honey instead of grapes.
Walker Honey Farm honey can be found on the shelves of H-E-B, Brookshire Brothers and mom and pop shops up and down the I-35 corridor.
Bee to bottle
The season begins in April when beekeepers split their hives and evaluate winter losses.
Beekeepers split a preexisting hive, turning it into two or three more hives. They separate the resources, divide up the bees and introduce new queens to the hives.
“We have to have high peak numbers, due to the high mortality rates of hives nationwide,” Butler said. “We will range between 500 to 1,000 hives, which is relatively small for a commercial beekeeping operation.”
Butler has 32 to 60 hives per apiary location spread across Texas. Some of their hives are located in Central Texas and Hill Country.
Each hive has one queen and about 50,000 bees.
When the flowers begin blooming in the spring and producing nectar, bees will seek out the forage and start producing honey.
“Bees see differently than we do and are attracted to the bright colors of flowers,” Butler said. “They’re foraging for carbohydrates, protein and fat. They will drink the nectar from the flowers and store it to take back to their hive.”
Some honeys taste different from others because of the bees’ nectar source.
The nectar from one flower does not taste the same as the nectar from another flower.
“We move our bees to different places at different timetables to capitalize on a specific nectar source to capture a mono floral honey,” Butler said. “That’s a big part of the process. We are selective about where we want our bees and what we want them foraging on.”
But flowers need rainfall to bloom and produce nectar.
“You need your rain spaced out to have the highest productivity of nectar from the flowers for the bees to really take advantage of that,” Butler said. “Texas is unique in that you can run bees in any part of the state.”
Once the bees collect the nectar, they use enzymes and proteins to breakdown the complex sugars.
The bees return to their hive and pass the nectar between other bees, further breaking down the nectar and reducing the water content.
The busy bees fan their wings to create an air current to evaporate the remaining water and thicken the nectar into honey. The honey is then stored in the honeycomb cells.
Butler starts harvesting and extracting honey in mid-May or June.
The season typically ends in July or August, depending on how high temperatures rise.
Nature’s busy little workers can produce 30 to 60 pounds of honey per hive.
“Last year, we made roughly 40,000 pounds of honey, and we’ll usually range somewhere between 15,000 and 40,000 pounds,” Butler said. “A big part of honey production is not just rainfall but timeliness of the rains.”
When the honey is harvested and taken back to the shop to begin the extraction process, Butler will strip the honeycomb frames and remove the wax cap.
The uncapped frames allow the honey to move freely when they are placed inside a centrifugal extractor. The machine will rotate the frames, throwing the honey from the frames and into a reservoir at the middle of the extractor.
The honey goes through a strainer, removing any remaining wax and other particles from the gold liquid. Then, the honey is pumped into 55-gallon barrel drums where the honey is stored before being bottled, labeled and sold.
Sweet rewards
Seeing families enjoying the sweet taste of summer with honey is the reason Walker Honey Farm takes pride in beekeeping.
“There’s something very cathartic and relaxing about interacting and being a part of a natural cycle and aiding the bees in their process of producing honey,” Butler said. “Being stung isn’t fun, and it gets hot in the summer when we’re harvesting, but being out in nature is very calming.”
The work may be difficult, but they have a passion for beekeeping and sharing that with others.
“People love honey. It holds a special place for a lot of different people, but to be able to relate and see customers face to face that are buying your products is wonderful,” Butler said. “It’s great being able to directly interact with your customers and educate them on the ins and outs of beekeeping.”
Very interesting! A lot of time, work, and effort! Would love to learn more about producing honey! I assume lots of work goes into making honey. Amazing!!!