Comment by uxhacker
7 hours ago
But the risk is actually more broad than the article points out. Any honey where enough of the nectar comes from rhododendrons could be dangerous.
Grayanotoxin containing Rhododendron occur not just in Nepal, but in Turkey, North America, and Europe.
I think there are other plants that the bees concentrate the toxins of.
Another is Kalmia latifolia, the mountain laurel, the state flower of Pennsylvania. According to records at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History [1], "Benjamin Smith Barton (an American botanist in the late 1700s) wrote that in the autumn and winter of the year 1790, many people died in Pennsylvania from the effects of wild honey, collected from Kalmia plants."
[1] https://carnegiemnh.org/collected-day-1959/
I know that West Virginia has entire Rhododendron forests. They are pretty awesome.
And yet we are only hearing of this now, whereas botulism risk for example is a widely known reason to avoid honey for infants.
It must end up being rare for some other reason.