Skip to main content

#36: Honey


 
Litinsects #36: Honey 

Honey is the only insect-made product consumed by humans! But how exactly is it made?
 
It all starts with a forager bee collecting nectar from flowers. The nectar is stored in a special sac called a CROP or honey stomach and transported back to the hive, where it is regurgitated and ingested by a processor bee. Inside the bee’s honey stomach special glands secrete proteins and ENZYMES, which begin to break down large sugar molecules into smaller ones and change the chemical composition of the nectar. The regurgitation and ingestion process happens multiple times until finally the pre-honey is put into a hexagonal cell made of beeswax inside the hive. Bees fan the nectar with their wings which evaporates a lot of water and raises the sugar content, preventing microbes from being able to grow. Finally, the cell is capped with wax and the honey can be stored for the bees to eat later. Because honey sustains a hive over the winter, beekeepers can’t take all the honey from a hive. But bees usually make much more than they need for themselves.
 
Now for some honey fun facts 🍯 🐝
  • Honey has antimicrobial properties and is the only food that does not go bad. Archaeologists have found honey in ancient Egyptian tombs that was 3,000 years old and still edible!
  • Bee products like honey and beeswax have been used by humans since 7,000 BCE!
  • A bee produces only a fraction of a teaspoon of honey in its entire lifetime
  • A hive collectively flies about 55,000 miles to produce a pound of honey
  • Not all bees make honey and not all honey is made by bees! (Some wasps do as well)
  • The type of flowers from which the bees collect nectar determine flavor and color of the honey
So next time you’re eating some sweet delicious honey, just remember it’s been regurgitated multiple times by insects 😛

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

#13: Insect Legs

Litinsects #13: Insect Legs Insect legs can be as diverse as the animals themselves. Some are long and slender like a crane fly’s, some are short and hefty like a mole cricket’s. But what all insects share is the number and layout of those legs. Hexapods have 6 LEGS, a pair each of fore, mid, and hind legs that are made up of the same basic units. Starting closest to the body, they are:  (1) the coxa, which attaches the leg to the thorax  (2) the trochanter (3) the femur, which is oft en the thickest segment  (4) the tibia, often covered in tiny hairs (5) the tarsus, which contains 5 “pseudo-segments”  (6) the pretarsal claws, of which most insects have 2 on each leg The basic units of the leg always occur in this order but may be reduced or highly modified in some species to fit certain tasks such as running, digging, swimming, grasping, or jumping. This photo sums it up perfectly: from < https://wiki.bugwood.org/File:Insect...

WELCOME: Social Distancing Entomology Course

All week I’ve been seeing videos and posts of the creative stuff people have been doing while social distancing, all the while thinking, what could I contribute to all the people sitting at home on social media all day?? Well this morning it hit me. I will do what I do best! And that is... drop some nerd knowledge on you all 🤓 Welcome to my social distancing ENTOMOLOGY COURSE!  Every day I will post an insect photo, most of which I’ve taken through my microscope, and explain about the insect group or the feature pictured. My hope is that you might learn something new about insects and maybe, just mayyyyybe, be a bit more fascinated and a bit less grossed out by the most diverse and arguably most successful group of animals to ever live... thanks for reading, stay tuned 🦋 🦟 🦗 🐞 🐜 🐛

#48: House Dust Mites

Litinsects #48:  Month of Mites, Part 4 One of the most well-known mite species, probably because they live so close to us, is the house dust mite. Just a warning, this one’s super interesting but slightly gross...   © Gilles San Martin Dust mites are microscopically small, 0.2-0.3 mm in size, and have a COSMOPOLITAN distribution. They are found pretty much everywhere humans live Dust is made up of dead human skin cells and also contains hair, dirt, mold spores, pollen, and other microscopic debris. Dust mites feed primarily on dead skin but don’t worry, they DON‘T BITE humans As I’m sure you’ve heard by now, our mattresses, pillows, carpets, and upholstered furniture are FULL of both living and dead dust mites. Since they love warmth, darkness, and humidity and because we shed plenty of dead skin cells while we sleep, our beds are pretty much the ideal place for them to live! Dust mites are well known because they are associated with allergies in about 1-2% of the world popul...