Is honey vegan?

[Muggle]

Of course it is! Honey is a plant product!

 

[Digger]

I'm just askin'...

You're just a little troublemaker is what you are.

 

[Digger]

My honey is.

That's a whole other thread entirely that surprisingly hasn't transferred over from the other board yet.

 

[Josh James xVx]

Well Honey is all well and good, But what if I get eggs from my friends farm where I know the chickens are happy?

There's two ways to answer this question, so for the sake of completion I'll answer it both ways.

1 - Just because something is ethical doesn't mean it's vegan. Vegans simply don't use, wear or consume animal products period. There's no real wiggle room there.

2 - How can you be sure the chickens wouldn't be happier keeping the eggs? I've read that if nobody collects unfertilized eggs the hens reabsorb the nutrients themselves. In a way, isn't that stealing?

 

[Alice-Bee]

There's two ways to answer this question, so for the sake of completion I'll answer it both ways.

1 - Just because something is ethical doesn't mean it's vegan. Vegans simply don't use, wear or consume animal products period. There's no real wiggle room there.

2 - How can you be sure the chickens wouldn't be happier keeping the eggs? I've read that if nobody collects unfertilized eggs the hens reabsorb the nutrients themselves. In a way, isn't that stealing?

Yo Josh...you ever hear of sarcasim bro....

 

[Dropkick]

2 - How can you be sure the chickens wouldn't be happier keeping the eggs? I've read that if nobody collects unfertilized eggs the hens reabsorb the nutrients themselves. In a way, isn't that stealing?

While the hen is brooding (trying to hatch) after it has collected a clutch (normally from the 1 egg it lays everyday, but occasionally 'adopted' from other hens) what it feels are enough eggs (anywhere from 2 to 16) it will sit on the eggs and stop laying. However, many hens never get broody and will just abandon their eggs. The hens that do get broody can sometimes starve themselves to death trying to hatch unfertilized eggs.
It's an ugly mess.

 

[K-II]

I don't think honey even eats.

 

[peacefulveglady]

Oh dear , LOL I don't believe so, I hate the taste of honey after all.

 

[SuicideBlonde]

Allergic.

 

[Dropkick]

I don't have a honey
Will you be my honey?
Or my Agave Nectar?

 

[WonderRandy]

Yes, Honey is vegan:

 

[CrazyCatLady]

Sorry to bring up an old post, but didn't want to start another honey debate.
Wanted to know what people thought about this. My friend keeps bees. She does not strip them of their honey, and she also supplements them in the winter. As she is helping save the bees, is her honey (the extra in the summer) bad? xxx

 

[Forster]

IMO it's a personal ethics issue, some will say it's bad, some won't. I'm assuming she doesn't think it's bad. If you want to eat the honey, you'll have to weigh your own ethics on the issue. If the vegan identity is important to you I'd avoid it. If you think that using the excess honey the bees produce (assuming they aren't harmed in the process) and you don't want to split that hair, go for it. If you are unsure if bees are harmed or not in the process, try and educate yourself before making a decision. Personally I'm fairly ignorant of what happens to bees, but for me it's a non issue because one, I eat very few sweets and two, there are alternatives.

 

[CrazyCatLady]

Tbh, it's not much of an issue with me as I could quite happily go without it.

I was just wondering people's opinions on it. I know we discussed what we would do with any eggs from rescued battery hens. The difference I suppose with this is that my friend keeps bees because she understands the importance of them. Perhaps she would keep them anyway even without the excess honey. But because it is there, she takes it. She cares about them a lot and would never strip them as she said there would then be no point.

Personally, the ethics of it 'belonging' to the bees wouldn't be a problem for me. My problem would be if any were harmed. Or how the queen is kept xxx

 

[FortyTwo]

Is honey vegan?

 

[Danielle]

Of course it is, silly. The vegan restaurant I go to serves honey

 

[Blobbenstein]

Honey has an interesting taste, but I prefer syrup; not that I should eat much being diabetic.

I gather that wild bees are the important ones, and they are solitary, and don't produce honey.

I don't know if this applies to the UK:

I was stunned to learn that no honey bees are native to the North American continent! The European honey bee was introduced to Jamestown, Virginia by the European settlers in the early 1600s. Researchers now suspect that non-native honey bees are partly responsible for the declining populations of native bee species. After all, a healthy honey bee hive contains about 50,000 bees, and they normally forage a radius of 3 miles from their hive, which equals more than 18,000 acres! Our little native bees have an average forage radius of only 100 yards, or 6.5 acres. Any wonder that they can’t compete?

http://ournativebees.com/native-bees-and-honey-bees/

I think bee keeping is an interesting activity though.

 

[kazyeeqen]

I agree with Blobbenstein's whole post.

 

[Forster]

Honey has an interesting taste, but I prefer syrup; not that I should eat much being diabetic.

I gather that wild bees are the important ones, and they are solitary, and don't produce honey.

I don't know if this applies to the UK:
http://ournativebees.com/native-bees-and-honey-bees/

I think bee keeping is an interesting activity though.

Interesting link, I never knew that before.

 

[das_nut]

*checks topic*

And they call me a troll!