Rewarewa
Rewarewa
or New Zealand Honeysuckle (Knightia excelsa) is a member
of the Protea family (Proteaceae) and is found throughout the North Island
of New Zealand and in the Marlborough Sounds at the top of the South Island.
A tree growing up to 30 metres high, conical in shape, and with a trunk up
to 1 metre in diameter, Rewarewa flowers from October to December with a complicated
flower structure adapted to bird pollination. This structure's purpose is
to prevent cross pollination.
Pollen Representation
The pollen grains of Rewarewa are large (around 40 - 50 microns) and as with
many bird pollinated plants,the pollen bearing anthers are separated from
the nectaries by some distance. Few pollen grains therefore find their way
into the nectar and this produces a honey with a low
pollen representation. Moar
(1985) suggested that this honey type requires at least 10% pollen to
classify as a monofloral honey. This also corresponds to a low total pollen
content with a normal range for this figure of 40,000 to 120,000 total pollen
grains per 10gms of honey. It is possible in years of very good production
to get 
levels
of over 60% Rewarewa pollen. However this only occurs very rarely, and must
also accompany good hive management practices for targeting monofloral honeys.
The most common other pollen type found in Rewarewa honey is Kamahi
which flowers in a similar time period.
Colour
Rewarewa honey is an amber colour averaging 91.6 mm
(Pfund Scale) with a standard deviation (SD) of 11.7mm. This is within
10 mm colour of the average colour of manuka honey
and the two can be confused on this basis. Rewarewa has a definite reddish
brown tint to its colour. While manuka is a more
expensive honey than rewarewa, as well as being an over represented pollen,
it is far more likely that Rewarewa honey is misidentified as manuka
than the other way round.
Sugar Profile
Rewarewa is a slow crystallizing honey but does crystallize naturally. Consequently
the crystals tend to be large. We only have around 100 sugar analyses for
Rewarewa at present but from initial data, average Glucose is 29.3% (SD 2.7),
Fructose 35.4% (SD 2.6) and Sucrose 2.1% (SD 2.2)
Flavour
Rewarewa honey has a delightful smooth malty flavour.
Because this honey is very close in colour to manuka, has a very low pollen percentage and a low total pollen, it can be difficult for the inexperienced (and some not so inexperienced!) to separate this honey from manuka.
home
return to top of page
© 1999
Airborne Honey Ltd
