All Natural Show Mead. Is it possible?

I have been reading around when I read this on a website "Honey - fresh natural honey has sufficient natural yeasts to ferment a low alcohol content mead but only if you do not heat it." (http://www.rabbitsfootmeadery.com/CAGM/guide_to_mead.html)

Now exactly what is meant by low alcohol is anyone's guess. Is it possible to make a decent all truly natural show mead given that: the honey is DARK, the water is high in minerals (let's say as heavy as lead like some water we get from tapping underground rivers from the water table which is undrinkable as it would eventually give you kidney stones), and the very best aeration practices are used. Sanitation must be optimum to ensure no spoilage yeasts other than any yeasts found in the honey are used. step feeding seems pointless as the amount of yeasts in starting must would be directly proportional to the amount of honey used.
I don't personally know what to think about this preposition. I would imagine that the least you can do is provide your own yeast which has low nutrient requirements and is best to showcase the flavors of your show mead.

Thanks Medsen!
I would have thought the same if it weren't for the author's conviction of this possibility, such as when he stated that "The recipe does not call for any additional yeast to be added and relies solely on the natural yeast that is present." That would be very misleading as it suggests that not even additional yeasts from barrels are needed. If it is possible in a clean glass carboy I'd say the success rate is low. I would be amazed he has misleading/incorrect data since he seemingly owns a meadery. I guess everyone can make mistakes (or let's just say give incomplete info).
Adding your own yeast would probably be much easier, although still challenging. However, at that point I imagine there is enough resources on these forums to decide whether a natural show mead (no raisins or extra pollen or anything) is possible. So far from what I read it seems that it is but may not be worth the average Joe's hassle

That reply reminds me of another post somewhere here on got mead that I read a while back in which it was mentioned that traditional practices of extracting honey involved destroying the hive. I think the post was in relation to the added nutrient level of the honey given that there is extra pollen etc etc. Didn't make a connection between this method and the possible added yeast population that could be gained. Of course one would need to destroy an actual hive and compare the yeast population vs gathering honey the more conventional/modern method.
BUT I have some very controversial information that suggests something else:

"'Take of spring water what quantity you please, and make it more than blood-warm, and dissolve honey in it till 'tis strong enough to bear an egg, the breadth of a shilling; then boil it gently near an hour, taking off the scum as it rises..."
So this means that Sir Digby at least boiled his honey, as well as all other ingredients. Moreover he states that:
"But let your liquor stand on the spice in a clean earthen pot till the next day; then strain it into a vessel that is fit for it; put the spice in a bag, and hang it in the vessel, stop it, and at three months draw it into bottles..."
The earthen pot mentioned could have been used only for fermentation and may contain some yeasts from prior brews, but this is not necessarily true. For all we know they had other uses for pots other than keeping them only for mead. The generic vessel that is fit for it does not even necessarily need to be a barrel, but it could be. A wine brewer on the other hand could very easily think that a vessel fit for wine/beer fermentation is the same as that needed for mead and could use a barrel full with the saccharomyces yeast.
With my very limited knowledge I would place my bet on something like this having happened. Otherwise the very first brew of a mazer in a clean vessel would be from yeast that just happened to be floating around in the atmosphere at your home. I wouldn't bet on this being reliable or really tasty (at least until the worst yeasts die off and you get a culture of good, stronger yeasts going in that barrel)

Conclusion: It is very possible that fermenting by the yeast found exclusively in honey is not only a wild goose chase and highly difficult to achieve, but could also be utterly pointless as previous traditional mazers used some strain of grape or beer yeast. We might as well grow our own culture of saccharomyces (quite easy really, we did it every year when making wine as we relied on wild yeast) or really just pour in your own damn packet of store bought yeast

Wish I posted this in the traditional section of these forums as this divulged into talking traditional recipes...

Also that site was surely incorrect because it stated:

"Some of the notable points of interest discovered in reproducing this recipe were:
Honey - fresh natural honey has sufficient natural yeasts to ferment a low alcohol content mead but only if you do not heat it..."

This is simply not true as the recipe seems to indicate that the yeast could have been introduced from anywhere except that batches specific yeast content because the honey was clearly boiled in the method section.

Btw, could I have a link to that all natural mead GK?

Edit: Just to be clear, I still think what WVMJack said is very possible. Rather than discrediting his comment I was discussing this information with relation to the specific recipe on that site. Wild yeast fermentation from honey as suggested in his post is still a possibility

Gone for a day and came back to this.. where to start!
- GK: started reading those brew threads and from what I read until now Mannye seems right. It seems you have to decipher it and put the puzzle pieces together. Seems like a good read whatever the case.
- Mannye: I agree. I have recently bumped into a recipe with incomplete information from one of my favorite authors, Patrick Rothfuss. Whether or not my final mead is anything near what he did is anyone's guess. I'd say yes and no. First of all he doesn't mention what honey he used (similar to old recipes who probably just had 'honey'). Honey being the main ingredient in mead I'd imagine that is problematic already on its own. Maybe I should post the recipe on these forums some day and see what some more experienced mazers can make of it.
- Shelley: 14% accidental fermentation? :O I've read threads of a hive getting drowned in the hollow of a tree and that is successful accidental fermentation. I can only imagine that your conditions were even more accidental.
- WVMJack: Whole hive mead?! I won't even comment on that, you know what I'm thinking. Wow

Oh look someone already posted about that recipe by Pat. It seems he made more than one recipe from his blogs but that recipe was one that he particularly enjoyed, I also have fenugreek, lapis lazuli and "brown flaky stuff". I buy just about everything online so that is the least of my issues. If only that thread wasn't in the patron's section. Although I guess I am way ahead if they haven't even gotten to finding out what brown flaky stuff is yet.
I use dark honey and heavy water for metheglins. I wasn't joking when I suggested using dark honey and heavy water at the beginning of this thread. I have found that that particular recipe could be fermented to AT LEAST 12% alcohol even with aeration just twice a day for the first 3 days and simply putting all ingredients into a fermentor. The yeast nutrient I used was even generic wine nutrient since Pat did not specify what nutrient he used. Mead fermented after 2 months and was immediately drinkable. Yes, immediately; a friend who also tried the recipe also found that it is very drinkable after 2 months. Fermentation was slow enough that the taste was good even before fermentation stopped. I tried using tronozymol for my 2nd batch and the mead is nowhere near drinkable after 2 months. Weird