Honeybees forage tree resins to concoct a complex substance called Propolis. They use this sticky substance as an antiseptic and antifungal coating as well as to fill small gaps and glue hive parts together. Propolis is often referred to as ‘bee glue’ by Beekeepers. Propolis has been used medicinally for millennia, and is of great […]

There are  20,000 bee species around the world. Most are solitary bees or social stingless bees however there are 250 bumblebee species and 9 honey bee species. Our industrious Western Honey Bee (Apis Mellifera) is native to Europe and Eurasia – having holed up somewhere warm during the last ice age and extended their range

You may know that a honeybee has a segmented abdomen that is very flexible due a series of overlapping plates. Where they meet, these plates slide effortlessly over each other as the bee bends. The odd thing about this is that where they rub, they appear to create no obvious friction or damage? Using a

This text and photo was originally posted on Facebook on Easter Sunday, hence the subject matter. Did you know that the 13th century Italian theologian, Peter of Capua, referred to the risen Christ at Easter as “Apis, Aetherea” drawing upon on a long cultural tradition of religious veneration for the humble honey bee? While the

Evolutionary theorist Charles Darwin considered Parasitic Wasps to be just “so evil” that they were clear evidence that God was having a day off. Up close, the reproductive habits of these insects sound like a SciFi trope. (Imagine Alien (1979) only without the iconic “Facehuggers”). The females use an adapted sting mechanism to inject eggs,

Although we tend to think of Honeybees as the only true honey producer, the products of other members of their extended family, most notably the Bumbles and certain Ants, have long had a place in the human food chain. Interestingly, the honey of the Australian Honeypot Ant, eaten and used medicinally by First Nations peoples

It’s not a triffle. It may surprise you that every young bee is fed ‘Queen Jelly’, (a secretion produced in the hypopharynx in the lower jaw of nurse bees) , for the first three days after they hatch. At that point, they all look identical. After day three though, feeding of all but a chosen

Every contact leaves a trace. In a recently published paper from a collaboration lead by meta-geneticist Dr. Solenn Patalano, Greek scientists outlined a way to identify and use trace DNA in honey. Although this may seem like just another quality test, the outlined methodology identifies the sources of both floral honey and non-floral honeydew and

Now infamous as the zombie creating fungus loose in “The Last of Us” games and TV show, Ophiocordyceps Unilateralis, often shortened to Cordyceps (as in the series), is a real thing that affects ants, bees and other members of the hymenoptera family. Thankfully this fungus. that actively takes over insect’s brains and forces them to

Did you know that some people who experience the distractions of ADHD charmingly refer to their particular neuro-divergence as having “bees in the brain”? (Note: the author of these posts has ‘bees on the brain’, but that is a different, incurable, and on one level more expensive malady?)

Being a Queen Bee can be a Game of Thrones. Not only can bees spontaneously dump their aging Queens for younger more productive heirs, and embark upon colonial ventures by swarming, it’s becoming increasingly obvious that many thrones are actually won by violence! In order to increase their survival chances, so called “USURPTION SWARMS” probe