Have you ever tasted honey? It’s that sweet, yummy stuff that we love to spread on toast or mix in tea. But have you ever wondered how bees make honey? Let’s find out together!
Bees are amazing little creatures. They fly around all day, visiting flowers and collecting something special called nectar. Nectar is a sugary liquid that flowers make, and bees love it! When a bee lands on a flower, it uses its tiny tongue to sip up the nectar. The nectar goes into a special part of the bee’s body called the honey stomach.
After collecting nectar, the bee flies back to its home, the hive. Inside the hive, something magical happens. The bee shares the nectar with other bees by passing it from mouth to mouth. This might sound a little strange, but it’s important! As they pass the nectar around, the bees mix it with a special liquid called an enzyme. This enzyme helps turn the nectar into thick, sticky honey.
Once the nectar has turned into honey, the bees store it in tiny wax containers called honeycombs. These honeycombs are like little jars that keep the honey safe and ready to eat when the bees need it.
Bees make honey to feed their young ones and to have food during times when there are no flowers around. They work very hard to make sure they have enough honey to survive.
Did you know that most of the honey we buy in stores comes from bees that live on farms? These bees make more honey than they need, so farmers collect the extra honey and sell it to us. This way, we get to enjoy the delicious honey without taking away the bees’ food.
Isn’t it amazing how bees make honey? They are like tiny chefs with a secret recipe! There are so many cool things to learn about the world around us. Keep asking questions and stay curious!
Flower Hunt Adventure: Go on a nature walk with an adult and look for different types of flowers. Take a notebook and draw the flowers you find. Try to spot bees visiting the flowers. How many bees can you count? Write down your observations and think about why bees might prefer certain flowers over others.
Honey Taste Test: With the help of an adult, gather different types of honey from the store, like clover, wildflower, or orange blossom honey. Taste each one and describe the flavors. Which one is your favorite? Discuss how the different flowers bees visit might change the taste of the honey.
Build a Bee Hive Model: Use materials like clay, playdough, or building blocks to create a model of a bee hive. Include honeycombs and bees. Think about how bees work together to make honey and store it in the hive. Share your model with family or friends and explain how bees make honey.
Sure! Here’s a sanitized version of the transcript:
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(Phone ringing) – Hi, it’s Doug. Honey, that sweet delicious substance that just tastes so good. There’s nothing quite like honey, is there? Syrup is similar in color and sweetness, but it has a different taste. Someone named Linda has a question about honey. Let’s give her a call now. (Phone ringing) – Hi Doug. – Hi Linda. – I have a question for you. How do bees make honey? – That is a great question. The fact that bees make honey is something most of us hear about, but it’s not something most of us have actually seen for ourselves. For a lot of people, including adults I talk to, the whole process can be a bit unclear and confusing. It involves flowers, and then the bees return to a hive, and well, something happens. It almost seems like a secret recipe. What is it that bees are doing in that hive? Figuring this out isn’t easy. It’s not like bees can tell us. They are quite secretive. They live in a hive, and we can’t just peek inside. Plus, they have stingers, and they wouldn’t appreciate that if we tried. But there is a way to observe what’s happening inside a beehive. Can you guess how? Now would be a good time to pause the video and discuss. Okay, you ready? One possibility might be to wear a bee suit to avoid getting stung and then use tiny lenses and cameras to look inside the hive. In fact, even easier than that, many bees are willing to live in hives constructed by people. If you create clear sides, you can actually watch what they’re doing. By creating these see-through hives, scientists have been able to carefully observe what bees do and have unlocked the secret of how bees make all that sweet, delicious honey.
If you watch a hive, you’ll see bees coming and going. You might know that bees are very busy, flying around from flower to flower and then returning to the hive. But what are they doing? Watch as a bee lands on a flower. You’ll see it has a little tongue. Inside every flower is a tiny pool of sugary liquid made by the plant, known as nectar. It’s such a small amount that it’s hard to notice, but on flowers like honeysuckle, you can actually taste it. At this point, it’s clear, very runny, and only slightly sweet. But it turns out that bees aren’t collecting it because they’re thirsty. When they do this, the nectar goes into a special honey stomach for storage. Once a bee returns to the hive, things start to get interesting. They regurgitate the nectar and pass it to other bees, who do the same, and this process continues a few times. This part might seem unusual, and scientists were puzzled by it at first. However, by studying bees, scientists discovered that inside the honey stomach, bees have a special liquid called an enzyme that, when mixed with the nectar, makes it thicker and stickier, transforming it into honey. By passing it back and forth, bees are adding more and more enzyme to the nectar. This is what turns nectar into honey. Once they’ve done this enough times, they store the liquid honey in small containers they create out of wax, known as honeycomb.
Why do bees go through all this effort? It’s not for us. They make honey to feed their young. For that reason, it might seem unkind for us to take honey away from them. However, almost all the honey sold in stores comes from domesticated bees, not wild ones. People raise bees on farms, similar to other farm animals. The bees on farms produce much more honey than they need for their young, so farmers collect the excess honey and sell it to people.
In summary, bees make honey by collecting sugary liquid called nectar from flowers and allowing it to mix with a special substance in one of their stomachs. That’s all for this week’s question. Thanks, Linda, for asking it. Now, for the next episode, I reached into my question jar and picked out three questions submitted to me that I’m considering answering. When this video ends, you’ll get to vote on one. You can choose from: how do you know if a mushroom is poisonous? What is chlorine? Or, who invented fans? So submit your vote when the video is over. I want to hear from all of you watching. There are mysteries all around us. Stay curious, and see you next week.
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This version maintains the essence of the original transcript while ensuring it is appropriate for all audiences.
