The Honey Bee:Amazing Facts
Agriculture depends greatly on the honeybee for pollination. Honeybees account for 80% of all insect pollination. Without such pollination, we would see a significant decrease in the yield of fruits and vegetables.
1. Honey bees must visit some 2 million flowers to make one pound of honey.
2. Honey bees fly about 55,000 miles to bring in enough nectar to make one pound of honey.
3. About one ounce of honey would fuel a honey bee's flight around the world.
4. Honey bees have been producing honey from flowering plants for about 10-20 million years.
5. The average honey bee worker makes 1/12 teaspoon of honey in her lifetime.
6. Honey bees contribute 8 to 10 billion dollars to the U.S. economy yearly.
7. Honey bees have four wings that are latched into pairs by hooks.
8. There are an estimated 200,000 beekeepers in the United States.
9. Honey bees are the only insects that produce food for humans.
10. The male honey bee, the drone, has a grandfather but no father.
11. The average honey bee flies between 12 and 15 miles per hour.
12. A honey bee flaps its wings about 12,000 times per minute.
13. A honey bee worker visits more than 2,000 flowers on a good day.
14. Honey bees communicate with one another by smell and dances.
15. The average summertime honey bee lives only about 28 to 35 days.
16. There are 3 million plus honey-producing colonies in the United States.
17. A honey bee visits between 50 and 100 flowers during one collection trip.
18. A typical healthy hive may contain up to 60,000 honey bees during peak times.
19. Honey bees make an average of 1,600 round trips in order to produce one ounce of honey.
20. Bees will travel as far as one or two miles from the hive to gather nectar.
21. Honey bees from a typical hive visit approximately 225,000 flowers per day.
22. Queen bees will lay as many as 2,000 eggs on a good day -- an average of one every 45 seconds.
23. A good queen bee will lay between 175,000 and 200,000 eggs per year.
24. The average central temperature of the brood nest is kept between 92 - 95 degrees Fahrenheit.
25. Beeswax production in most hives is only about 1.5% to 2.0% of the honey yield.
26. Approximately eight pounds of honey is eaten by bees to produce one pound of beeswax.
27. The Americas have no native honey bees - early pioneers first brought them from Europe.
28. Honey bees pollinate approximately 25% of all the foods humans consume.
29. Besides honey, honey bees produce wax and propolis, gather pollen, and produce royal jelly.
30. A typical foraging honey bee will work herself to death in about three weeks.
31. Bees collect 66 lbs of pollen per year, per hive.
32. The Honeybee uses pollen as a food.
33. Honey is used by the bees for food all year round.
34. Honey is an easily digestible, pure food.
35. Honey is hydroscopic and has antibacterial qualities.
36. Eating local honey can fend off allergies.
37. Secreted from glands, beeswax is used by the honeybee to build honey comb. It is used by humans in drugs, cosmetics, artists' materials, furniture polish and candles.
38. Propolis is Collected by honeybees from trees, the sticky resin is mixed with wax to make a sticky glue. The bees use this to seal cracks and repair their hive. It is used by humans as a health aid, and as the basis for fine wood varnishes.
39. Royal Jelly: The powerful, milky substance that turns an ordinary bee into a Queen Bee. It is made of digested pollen and honey or nectar mixed with a chemical secreted from a gland in a nursing bee's head. It commands premium prices rivaling imported caviar, and is used by some as a dietary supplement and fertility stimulant. It is loaded with all of the B vitamins.
40. Bee Venom: The "ouch" part of the honeybee. Although sharp pain and some swelling and itching are
natural reactions to a honeybee sting or most, a small percentage of individuals are highly allergic to bee venom. "Bee venom therapy" is widely practiced overseas and by some in the USA to address health problems such as arthritis, neuralgia, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and even Multiple Sclerosis.
41. There is only one queen per hive.
42. The queen mates only once with several male (drone) bees, and will remain fertile for life.
43. She lays up to 2000 eggs per day. Fertilized eggs become female (worker bees) and unfertilized eggs become male (drone bees).
44. All worker bees are female, but they are not able to reproduce.
45. The worker bee has a barbed stinger that results in her death following stinging, therefore, she can only sting once.
46. These male bees are kept on standby during the summer for mating with a virgin queen.
Honey has been delighting humans for over 40 centuries. In ancient Egypt taxes were paid with honey.
47. In early Greece and Rome honey symbolized fertility, love, and beauty. In the Bible this sublime nectar is called "the heavenly food".
48. The practice of honey collection and beekeeping dates back to the stone-age, as evidenced by cave
paintings.
49. Utah is known as the Beehive State.
50. It would take approximately one ounce of honey to fuel a bee's flight around the earth.
51. To make honey, bees drop the collected nectar into the honeycomb and then evaporate it by fanning their wings.
52. Honeybees dance to communicate the direction and distance of nectar sources.
53. The fructose in honey makes it sweeter than sugar. At 21 calories a teaspoon it is one and a half times sweeter than sugar.
54. Honey makes baked goods brown faster, and improves their shelf life.
55. Honey varies in color from almost clear to very dark, depending on the floral source and it's location, as well as the climate.
56. Honeybees are not aggressive by nature, and will not sting unless protecting their hive from an intruder or are unduly provoked.
57. Honeybees represent a highly organized society, with various bees having very specific roles during their lifetime: e.g., nurses, guards, grocers, housekeepers, construction workers, royal attendants, undertakers, foragers, etc.
58. From apples to almonds to the pumpkin in our pumpkin pies, we have bees to thank. Now, a condition known as Colony Collapse Disorder is causing bee populations to plummet, which means these foods are also at risk.
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