POWER — The Smoot Honey Company in Power is working like busy bees to place 1,800 hives for the start of honey season.
"Every third bite of food you take has some how been touched by bees,” said James Rehm, Smoot Honey Co-owner about the importance of bees.
In the Spring, Smoot Honey ships in package bees from queen breeders in California and Hamilton Honey Company in Hamilton) to place them in to their three hive locations between Vaughn and Sun River.
On April 10th Smoot filled all 1,800 hives with thousands more bees. The hives are in groups of four with a queen in each one.
The mission of the Smoot Honey since the 1930’s has been to offer a 100% pure local product. “It’s family business for me. Grandpa started somewhere in the 30’s 40’s. My uncles joined him, they moved to Montana in 1964 and we’ve been running in Montana since then,” said Rehm.
The bees are off to work into late summer before you can get your hands on their golden goodness at stores including IGA, 2Js, Super One Foods, and Harvest Bread, or by taking a trip out to Power.
“When you’re buying it in bulk from the store you don't really know where it comes from, so I really push for our local guys to buy ours because we’re here. If you know where your food comes from, your local beef, your local pigs, your local honey, any of that stuff. Buy local because it supports your community, you know where it comes from, it’s just a better way of eating,“ said Rehm.
