Pollen content on Argentinean honeys
Martin Irurueta & José Sánchez Sánchez, Botanical Department-Biology Faculty, University of Salamanca (Spain)
Today, the food products market has incremented the number of quality factors that must be met before commercialization, especially in developed countries, where the demand for food products of proven quality is high.
The honey market is no exception. In some European countries like Spain, France, Italy and Germany, for some years now, the recollection of honey is mono-floral, so to obtain products of high quality and price.
In Spain, for example, diverse studies have been taking place on the different communities, which were good for establishing a guaranty of origin, which are a "seal of quality" for the honeys produced in each region.
Furthermore, honeys introduced to their commercial circuits from other countries, besides meeting the above-mentioned parameters, they must be characterize by botanical origin, and in some cases, geographical as well.
So far, we have analyzed 15 samples total, taken during 1996/97/98, most of them from hives located in the province of Buenos Aires, although two samples from Entre Rios and one from La Pampa were included as well for comparison purposes.
The data we provide in this article are the preliminary results of broad study on Argentinean and Spaniards honeys taking place in the Botanic, Analytic Chemistry and Nutrition departments of the Salamanca University (Spain). This study has as an objective the chemical content in honeys, so to determine if these are directly related to botanical origins and/or geographical origins of each honey.
Sensorial analyses are taking place as well. These are done by a panel of tasters using, as a novelty, a piece of equipment known as "Electric Nose". The purpose of this is to determine if the data obtained can be linked to botanical origins.
In this occasion, we present the microscopic analysis from the quantitative point of view as well as the qualitative; in the first case we’ll know the pollen richness on that honey and we will be able to, perhaps, infer the extraction method implemented. Through the qualitative analysis, we will be able to determine the content of pollen types in the honey and we will have an idea of the plants the bee has visited. We could also deduce, by the pollen size, if the honey has been improperly filtered; this is of great importance because in some countries filtering is not permitted if doing so will cause a decrease in the natural content of pollen.
Quantitative Analysis
It consists in the recount of pollen grains contained in 10gr of the honey sample. The samples were grouped in classes that will reflect the pollen richness of each sample, according to Maurizio’s proposition (1939):
Class I: (pollen richness low: less than 20.000 grains per 10gr of honey) generally corresponds to mono-floral honeys. In our case this includes samples 3,5,11 and 14.
Class II: (pollen richness medium-low, about 20.000 to 100.000 grains/10gr of honey) most of the floral honeys. In our case, samples 1,7,9,12 and 13.
Class III: (pollen richness medium, 100.000 to 150.000 grains/10gr of honey) generally honeys with hyper-represented pollen. In our case, samples 2,4,6,8,10 and 15.
Class IV and V correspond, generally, to honeys obtained by pressing and because no samples are included in this classes, we can deduce that all honeys were obtained by centrifugation.
Because
of this, we can say, according to the work of other people, that the samples studied are
of a low to medium pollen content.
Qualitative Analysis
It consist on the identification, with an optic microscope, of the pollen
grains contained in the sediments obtained by centrifugation of the honey sample. There
are 50 types of pollen from 25 different families. Among these, the ones that are present
in more quantity are those of Eucalyptus, Lotus (lotus tenuis) and purple flower (Echium
plantagineum).
We have observed that eucalyptus pollen was present in all of the samples, that of cactus,
lotus and the cruciferas family in 14, that of purple flower in 13 and that of sunflower
and white clover in 12 of the samples.
Taking into consideration the values that are indicated by our legislation to classify the honeys according to their botanical origin, we have in catalogue 6 of the samples as multi-floral and the remaining 9 as mono-floral.
Of this last ones, samples 2,4,12, 15 were catalogued as eucalyptus honey, due to their eucalyptus pollen content which surpasses 70% as the legislation mandates. The minimum value (70%) corresponds to sample 12 and the maximum (92%) to sample 4. As accompanying pollen in all the eucalyptus honeys we have; Cactus (Carduss sp), Lotus (Lotus tenuis), white clover (Trifolium repens), and pollen from the cruciferas family.
Samples 6,7,11 and 13 were catalogued as clover honey as the legislation establishes that honeys with clover pollen content over 45% are considered mono-floral. With the previous legislation (1994), Lotus honey (which must had more than 20% of pollen of the same type) was distinguished, so samples 1,5 and 8 could have been classified as Lotus honey, but today’s legislation (1995), does not distinguish Lotus honey so they are included in the clover honey class. As accompanying pollen in clover honeys we have identified: purple flower (Echium plantagineum), Cactus (Carduss sp), eucalyptus and pollens from the cruciferas family.
We have catalogued sample 9 as sunflower honey as it posses 65% of pollen type Helianthus annuus, surpassing the 45% dictated by the legislation.
Because 9 of the 15 samples turned out to be mono-floral, we might think that in Argentina we can produce and commercialize as such, an important amount of these honeys.
Sample locations list:
- La Plata Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- Maciá Provincia de EntreRíos.
- Santa Rosa Provincia de La Pampa.
- General Belgrano Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- Bartolomé Bavio Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- Coronel Brandsen Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- Bartolomé Bavio Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- General Belgrano Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- Maciá Provincia de Entre Ríos.
- Escobar Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- Ranchos Provinciade Buenos Aires
- Ranchos Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- City Bell Provincia de Buenos Aires.
- Correa Provincia de Buenos Aires.
Bartolomé Bavio
Buenos Aires. Argentine
 |
Bee illnesses facts |
 |
|
 |
|
|
|
Toxicity in the pesticides for bees |
| |
|
|
 |
|
