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How Honey Is Made

Honey is a sweet treat that tastes great and has lots of nutritional value, and it's also made in a really cool way. Honeybees devote their lives to jobs that help their colony to survive, and making honey is part of that process. A colony of bees will make around 100 pounds of honey each year, but a single bee will only make about 1/12th of a teaspoon over the course of their entire life. Each time a honeybee goes out to look for nectar, it will visit around 100 different flowers and travel about 5 miles.

Why Do Bees Make Honey?

Colonies need honey for two reasons. The first reason is that honey actually acts as insulation to help keep the hive warm in cold weather. The second reason is that honey is a food source for the bees that gives them the energy they need to do their work. Worker bees that fly around collecting nectar need lots of energy to make their long flights. But typically, a colony will produce much more honey than it needs. Colonies that have their excess honey harvested by beekeepers are healthier than colonies that cope with an overabundance of honey. After beekeepers remove the honey, they put it in a jar it to use or sell.

Made by Nature

Making honey is a complicated process. It starts when a worker bee collects nectar from flowers. The bee stores the nectar in its honey stomach for the trip back to the hive. Then, it transfers the nectar to another bee in the hive. That bee then spits the nectar into a cell in the honeycomb. A chemical in the bee's honey stomach helps the nectar to break down and ripen into honey. The nectar also needs to be dried out to become honey. The bees in the hive help this to happen by fanning the nectar with their wings. Once the honey is ready, the bees seal it inside the cells of the honeycomb with wax.

Humans use honey for lots of things. It's an all-natural sweetener that's popular to use in tea and baked goods or simply slathered on toast. It also has some health benefits: Honey contains vitamins, antioxidants, amino acids, and minerals. Honey is also a natural antibacterial substance. Long before antibiotics existed, people would apply honey to burns or wounds to prevent infection and encourage healthy healing. Honey is also good at soothing throats that are sore from coughing, so people often eat some or put some in a cup of tea to drink when they're suffering from a cold or cough.

How Is Beeswax Made?

Worker bees make beeswax, which is the basic building material that makes up their hive. Hundreds of different compounds go into making beeswax, and the actual composition of the wax depends on where the colony is located. Wax is made in special glands on the belly of each worker bee. The wax is first secreted as tiny flakes, which are scraped off and chewed by the bees to make it soft. Then, they can form it into honeycombs and use it to seal each honeycomb cell once it's filled with honey.

Beekeepers take honey out of the hives in their care, but they also remove beeswax. They remove the beeswax by slicing through the top of the honeycomb with a heated knife. Beeswax is desirable because it is an ingredient in many skin-care products. Beeswax is fantastic at sealing moisture into the skin. It also contains antioxidants that are good for the complexion. It's also a natural anti-inflammatory agent. And since it's wax, beeswax can be used to make candles, too.

Additional Resources

• Why Do Bees Make Hexagons in Their Hives? A hexagon is a strong shape that doesn't waste any space.
• How Do Bees Make Honey? Nectar is turned into honey by adding an enzyme from bee stomachs and then drying it out.
• A Guide to How Bees Make Honey: Not all bees make honey. In fact, many types of bees don't.
• How Do Bees Make Honey? (It's Not Just Bee Barf): The process of making honey is a little more complicated than just swallowing and spitting up nectar.
• Do All Bees Make Honey? Only one species of bee makes honey.
• Why Do Bees Make Honey? Honey is good food for humans, and it's also good food for bees.
• Helping Agriculture's Helpful Honeybees: We need bees for their honey and wax, and we also need them because they pollinate plants as they collect nectar.
• Ten Facts About Honeybees: Most bees only live for a month or two, but they get a lot done during that time.
• 11 Things People Believe About Bees That Aren't True: A lot of bees don't sting, and most of them won't sting you unless they feel threatened.
• Honeybees and Their Habitats and Products: Honey and beeswax have been collected and used by humans for thousands of years!
• The Colony and its Organization: Bees are social creatures that work together to survive.
• How Do Bees Make Honeycomb? A bee has to eat eight ounces of honey to make one ounce of wax.
• What Other Things Do Bees Make Besides Honey? Bees make lots of things, including wax, royal jelly, and propolis.
• Beekeeping 101: Should You Raise Honeybees? Beekeeping can be a great hobby, but it isn't for everyone.
• Beehive Hierarchy and Activities: Nearly all of the important work in a beehive is done by female bees.
• Nine Hive Jobs of Honeybees: Bees can have lots of jobs in a hive, from taking care of baby bees to building honeycomb to guarding the entrance against intruders.
• Humans Used Beeswax as Long Ago as Neolithic Era, Study Finds: Beeswax has been found in pottery that's 9,000 years old!
• How Honey Made Us Human: Eating honey helped early humans to survive and evolve.
• Leaving Enough Honey and How it Helps Your Hive Survive: It's important that beekeepers leave enough honey in their hives for the bees, or else the bees won't have enough to eat.