Tu Revista Latina Magazine

Straight from the Hive

A love for bees and a love of family is the reason the Garcia’s have kept their 60-year-old beekeeping business up and running. All along, the Garcia family has worked in harmony with nature, the bees and each other to produce a product as pure as nature intended. They fully understand the bees, the colonies, the product and the importance of providing quality honey to their customers – some of which have been with them since day one.

Felipe Garcia Sr. purchased the bee farm in 1952 when its original owner grew ill. Today, Mr. Garcia’s grandson, Pancho Garcia, is one of the owners of Garcia Brothers Honey Farm and acts as the farms official/unofficial spokesperson.

“I can remember being out in the field since I was in diapers. I would help my parents by filling containers,” recalls Pancho. It’s a business that has spanned three generations. Pancho’s father, Jerry Garcia, has been working alongside his father, Felipe Sr., since he was 15 years old. He and his wife Rose always instilled in their three children that hard work and a good education are the keys to success.

“It’s funny because my father didn’t want us to work on the farm. He used to tell us he did so bad in school that he would bribe the teachers with honey just to let him move on to the next grade,” chuckles Pancho. “All of us attended college, but after I spent many years in the professional 9-5 world, I found myself wishing to come home and work with the bees,” admitted Pancho. He attended New Mexico State University where he received a degree in Agriculture Biology. He went on to work for the Federal Government in import and exportation. Pancho continues, “I couldn’t control which products were being allowed in and out of the country due to government policies, but at home I could control our product, and make sure our product remained unaltered.”

The Garcia’s produce what they call pure raw honey. “We don’t put additives in our product; we don’t want to damage something that sells itself. The FDA allows honey producers to put products in honey and still call it natural honey,” says Pancho. The Garcia’s sell their honey wholesale. Their clients come from New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, and Colorado. Locally, they have costumers who have been purchasing their honey for over 20 years. “We have costumers who have known us for so long that they bring their own jars, go into the honey house and fill them up. Then, they sit down with us and catch us up on what’s been happening around town,” chuckles Pancho.

Honey season begins mid-May through mid-October. Occasionally, it can last till November depending on environmental factors. The flavor and color of the honey depends on the type of nectar the bees are collecting. The darker honey comes from alfalfa and wildflower and is recommended for allergies, cooking, and baking. “The dark honey brings a nice flavor to coffee and tea. The elderly, including those who are diabetic, enjoy honey in their beverages since they cannot have sugar and we’ve been told that their doctors approve it,” claims Pancho. Mesquite produces a light colored and very sweet honey and it is always in high demand.

The Garcia’s recommend not throwing away hardened honey, instead, place the jar in a bowl or pot of warm water, and the honey will liquefy almost immediately. If the honey is not hardening, it means that the honey is not pure and that something has been added to it.

Producing honey is just one major part of the Garcia Brothers operations; they also bring the bees on a yearly trip to California. The bees are used to pollinate almonds, citrus, plums, cherries, and apricots. Pancho shares, “I look forward to the trips to California, we have bees from the New Mexico stateline all the way to the Hatch Valley, so when I go on these trips, it gives me a change of scenery.”

Pancho says the long trip can be very hard on the bees. He has to make sure they are healthy for pollination so he will add a type of antibiotic to their diet that will help them sustain the trip. Pancho also enjoys the trips because he interacts with other beekeepers who share new beekeeping methods with him. Although he is not always willing to adapt to newer techniques, which has earned him the nick name “Ancient Man,” he does pay attention in case he can incorporate their new ways with his old ways. Pancho admits, “I get my old school ways from my grandfather, when most people who work with bees wear gloves, we don’t. Grandfather says disease is easier to spread to the bees when wearing gloves, so it’s best to go bare handed. The down side is that we get stung a couple times a day!”

Pancho says beekeeping is not for the faint of heart. The hours are long and the work is demanding. “Bees are designed to work non-stop, and that means we have to stay on top of their work, which means we don’t stop because they don’t.”

Today, Felipe Garcia Sr. is 85 years old and still oversees the farm. “Grandfather can’t do the workload he did before but everyday he gets up at 5:30 am and drives out to the farm just to make sure it’s still there. He’s afraid that one day, it will all blow away,” says Pancho.

Summer 2011