The honey business took a major hit last season with prices falling down to half, according to Westman area beekeeper Myron Peters.

This year's spring has shown its own challenges as the dandelion and caragana flow were short, resulting in beekeepers having to do extra feeding as bees did not seem to build up, said Peters. Due to the lack of wildflowers in the area, he added canola is used for around 90 per cent of their honey production.

Another issue has been importation of honey from other countries. Peters said the competition has proven to be an obstacle, but hopes Canadian companies will look to local producers instead of overseas. He noted some companies have already announced they will discontinue ordering from outside the country, and will rather share their business with Canadian farmers.

"It will be nice to see that ... that definitely will help support our market here and strengthen our market again. Honey prices have come up a little bit, but we're definitely still on the shy end of things," he said.

He said currently no one is buying honey because they are waiting for their options and to see how the crops will turn out. He is optimistic for the end of the season, though, which is when the majority of the crop will come in.

The Manitoba average amount of honey collected each season is over 74 kilograms per hive. The farm Peters works on has 800 hives.