A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A BEE

A Day in the Life of a Bee

​Most of us enjoy eating and using honey in various ways, but do we ever stop to think of the labor involved in its production? There is much labor involved in bringing honey to market. However, we still have to be primarily thankful to the honey bees for their production work. A day in the life of a Bee. The bee starts off by using the sun for navigating its journey through the work day. Upon finding the flower or plant of choice the bee then collect the sugary juice called nectar. This is done by using its tongue to suck it out of the plant or flower.
 
The honey bee collect nectar and pollen as food to feed the entire colony.  In so doing, the bee pollinates plants. The bee sometimes frequent a plant not for its nectar, but instead to collect pollen. It is not unusual for a colony to consume 100 pounds of pollen in a season. As it is a normal part of the honey bee’s diet. The bee gets a large part of its nutrients such as vitamins, minerals, proteins, carbohydrate and lipids from pollen. 

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​The majority of bees collect either pollen or nectar on a trip, however, a few carry both. Unlike nectar, pollen is carried on the hind leg of a bee in the hairy receptacle. She can carry about half her weight in pollen, amazing. Back at home the pollen is stuffed into cells. It is placed around the brood nest. Pollen is, also, turned into beebread.
 
The nectar carried by a bee is stored in their honey stomach, the bee has two stomachs: one for food and the other for honey. Once back to the hive, nectar stored in the honey stomach is passed from one worker to the next. This is done until they diminish the water in it, and at that point the nectar is now honey in its first stage. The honey is then stored in the cells of the honeycomb. 

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​One can find up to 60,000 bees in one hive, and most bees in that hive will be workers. The females in the hive are the workers doing the hard work as the males are just there to help reproduce. Once a male help reproduce he dies, poor fella. The working bee will leave the hive and travel within a radius of four to five miles. This is to find nectar and pollen. To produce honey an enzyme that is secreted from a gland in the bee is mixed with nectar.
 
Some more of this enzyme is even dropped into the cells containing nectar (honey first stage) placed there by the bee. And, the bee uses her wings to fan this mixture until it become thicker losing most of its water content. The honeycomb is then capped over with beeswax, and is now ready.  The next time you use some honey consider the industry of the bee.