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Nodding
Thistle
 Nodding
Thistle (Carduus nutans) is considered a weed species in
New Zealand. However from the beekeeper's point of view, it is
an extremely valuable "weed". The honey from Nodding
Thistle is like no other. With a delightful perfumed floral bouquet,
light flavour and slow crystallizing properties, it is one of
our finest honey types. Unfortunately it is also becoming one
of our more scarce varieties. In recent years, the Nodding Thistle
honey crop has become much less reliable that before. This has
been primarily due to the introduction of a number of insects
for biological control of Nodding Thistle in New Zealand. One
of these feeds on the seeds, disrupting nectar production in the
flower and one feeds on the crown of the young thistles before
they flower, stunting
their growth, preventing them flowering and in some cases killing
the plant altogether. Now, it is only when these insects are at
a low ebb, does a good Nodding Thistle honey crop occur.
Pollen Content
One aspect of Nodding Thistle honey is that it is characterised
by a very low pollen representation. Our estimates are around
500-1,000 pollen grains per 10grams of honey and total pollen
counts averaging 21,000 per 10 grams with a range of 10,000 to
50,000. Consequently, Nodding Thistle honey rarely has more than
10% Nodding Thistle pollen. Why this is so has not been documented,
but some possible reaosns might include: 
- The
pollen grains are large (around 60 microns) and may be able
to be removed by the bees from the nectar during collection
and ripening.
- The
nectar source is at the bottom of long thin, deep florets
and the large pollen grains can't fall into the nectar.
- The
pollen may be given off first before the nectar is present.
Certainly there are bees that get very covered with Nodding
Thistle pollen when collecting pollen.
Sugar
Profile
Nodding Thistle honey
has a (Glucose-Water)/Fructose
ratio average of 0.295 so is a slow
crystallising honey. Levels as low as 0.21 have been recorded.
It also has a relatively high average sucrose level of 4.0%,
so quite often has levels of sucrose that are higher than permitted
under Codex standards.
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