Facts About Beeswax and Honey

Beeswax Production

• Honey bees also produce beeswax. The honeybees eat as much honey as they can manage and then huddle together to heat up their cluster. The wax comes from tiny scales that the bees "sweat" from their undersides. The consumption of 10 pounds of honey results in one pound of beeswax.

Nectar

• Honey is made by honeybees using nectar. Nectar mainly consists of water with some sugars. The nectar comes from flowers, such as dandelions, and the blossoms of fruit trees. Honey bees have two stomachs -- one for holding nectar, which they suck from the flower blossoms using their tongues, and a normal one. In order to fill their honey stomachs, these bees must work on between 1,000 and 1,500 flowers. Once the stomach is full of nectar, it weighs almost as much as the honeybee.

The Hive

• Once they have returned to the hive, the honeybees pass the nectar to worker bees. The worker bees suck the nectar from the stomachs of the honeybees using their mouths, and then chew it for about 30 minutes before spreading it throughout the honeycombs. The water in the nectar evaporates, leaving a thick syrup. When it is of the right consistency, the honey is sealed using wax. Here it stays until it is eaten by the bees. It is estimated that in one year a colony of bees will consume somewhere in the region of 120 to 200 lbs of honey.

Human Consumption

• All humans need carbohydrates, which create and replace heat and energy. The advantage that honey has over other natural sources of carbohydrates is that it does not need to go through the process of inversion once eaten because this has already been done by the bees when they predigest it. This means that human stomachs do not need to waste energy for this process. While this may not be so important for healthy people, it can benefit those with weak digestive systems.

Commercial Aspects

• Beeswax has been used commercially for centuries and still has many uses today. These uses include high quality candles, soap, skincare, lubrication. It may also be used in sewing, as a coating for medicinal pills and as a polish.

  Cultivating honey can be a long and arduous process. Further, it is not a necessity in the daily diets of most people. There are about 1,500 commercial honey producers in the U.S. and the industry is threatened by cut-rate foreign imports, unethical brokers and periodic plagues that mysteriously kill many bees.

  One way to use beekeeping and produce beeswax and honey positively is by helping people in developing countries make a living from keeping hives. By using indigenous bees and offering training and equipment, this can be a cost effective way of enabling sustainable livelihoods.