I have always been fascinated by the way insects live and work, especially ants and bees.  My godfather kept bees on his farm and as kids we sometimes got too close to them.  My mother would cut a fresh garlic clove in half and place it on our skin to help soothe the pain of their stings.  Nevertheless, I had and still have a lot of respect for honeybees.  It has always amazed me the way one queen bee, between 40,000 to 60,000 worker bees and a few hundred drone bees work as a group, in order and harmony in each hive.  There is a social order and division of labor between the various bees.  The queen bee does not work; she only lays eggs.  The worker bees are all female and they do many chores in an organized way—some feed the larvae, some guard the hive, some gather the nectar, some fan the nectar with their wings to evaporate the water…  The drone bees are male and their job is to mate with the queen bee so she can lay eggs.

Worker honeybees live only about four to six weeks during summer months and approximately three weeks of their life are filled with constant hard work.  During winter months when honeybees do not work, they live four to nine months.  All that work and one bee makes only one-twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in her lifetime!  On each trip, she visits approximately 100 flowers to collect nectar and pollen, and makes about 10 trips a day.

The collected nectar is stored in a special pouch in the honeybee’s body.  She adds enzymes to the nectar from special glands and when her pouch is full, she returns to her hive.  At the hive, she regurgitates the nectar and passes it to other worker bees that swallow it again, adding more enzymes.  They then store the nectar into honeycombs.  Still other worker bees fan the stored nectar with their wings to evaporate the water.  When the honey is ready, they cover the honeycomb with wax to seal it.

In addition to making honey, honeybees play a major role in much of the food we eat.  Without their pollination, farmers would not be able to grow many of the crops of fruits, vegetables and grains we eat every day.

As many of us know, millions of honeybees in the U.S. and billions worldwide have disappeared from their hives since 2006.  The rapid spread of Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) has caused alarm among governments, scientists and beekeepers.  The causes of CCD are complex and not yet fully understood.  Considering that about a third of the food we consume comes from pollination, the search for a cause is an urgent matter for scientists who are trying to find ways to stop this epidemic.  Honeybee deaths had been blamed on everything from mites to viruses to the environment.  A very interesting and recent article and video on CCD (August 13, 2010) are on Penn State University’s website http://live.psu.edu/story/47801/rss69.  And now there's some good news for the honeybees!

Recently, there has been a major breakthrough.  The problem is not yet solved, but good things are happening.  In the October 6, 2010 issue of The New York Times, it was reported that U.S. Army scientists in Maryland and bee experts from the University of Montana and Montana State University, working together, have identified a virus-fungus combination that has been killing the billions of honeybees worldwide since 2006.

Here’s a paragraph from that article in The New York Times.  The paragraph ends with the words “to find something they did not even know they were looking for”—serendipity—my favorite word: 
“The Army software system — an advance itself in the growing field of protein research, or proteomics — is designed to test and identify biological agents in circumstances where commanders might have no idea what sort of threat they face. The system searches out the unique proteins in a sample, then identifies a virus or other microscopic life form based on the proteins it is known to contain. The power of that idea in military or bee defense is immense, researchers say, in that it allows them to use what they already know to find something they did not even know they were looking for.”

If you would like to read the full article, here’s the link:

www.nytimes.com/2010/10/07/science/07bees.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=honeybees&st=cse

Let's all make a good wish for the honeybees.

And about the food honeybees create, which is the only food we eat made by insects--

Maybe it is not so appetizing to read words such as "bees regurgitating the nectar...", but honey is a sweet and healthy gift from honeybees.  It is great in tea as a sugar substitute and as a topping for ice cream.  But did you know that honey has been useful to mankind for over 4,500 years?  The first proof of its use as an ointment for wounds comes from a clay tablet found in ancient Sumeria dating back to 2500 BC.  Ancient Egyptians also used honey to heal wounds, as did the ancient Greeks and Romans.

Modern research has proven that honey can be used as an emollient in wound healing.  It fights inflammations, kills bacteria and heals burns.

Honey also is a natural anti-oxidant when eaten as food.  It does not contain any sodium, cholesterol or fat and has a very complex composition that includes enzymes, folic acid, minerals… It is estimated that honey contains hundreds of components, and even with today’s modern technology, the mysteries of honey are not completely solved.

There are many flavors of honey.  Honey also varies in color from very light to very dark.  The flavor and color of honey depend on the flowers the nectar is collected from.

Honey is the only food that does not spoil with time if it is kept in a sealed jar.  But it does crystallize with time.  The best way to store honey is at room temperature, away from sunlight.  Never store it in a refrigerator; honey will crystallize more quickly if exposed to low temperatures.  You can return it to its original liquid form by placing the jar in warm water until it liquefies, but never place the jar in hot or boiling water.

Some tidbits—

Napoleon Bonaparte used the bee as a symbol of his empire, emblazoning the bee on his robes and flags.
 

A drone bee does not have a stinger.  A worker bee can sting only once.  She stings only in defense and when she stings, she flies away and dies.

Honeybees communicate to each other the location of nectar sources by dancing.  (A couple of interesting videos:  Go to youtube.com and do a search for “dancing honeybee using vector calculus to communicate” and do another search for “honey bees life cycle.”)