The Hive Family

You have learned so much about honeybees! You know about their amazing body parts. You know about their long trips outside. Now we will put all the pieces together. Making honey is a huge job. One bee cannot do it alone. It takes a whole family of bees. They work together as a large team. Every bee has a special job to do. Let us review the exact steps they take. We will see how they make winter food. They turn flower juice into thick, sweet honey.

Picking the Best Flowers

Bees leave the hive every single day. They fly out to find fresh food. They look for sweet nectar inside blossoms. They also look for dusty pollen. Bees are very smart shoppers. They do not visit every flower. They have favorite plants to visit. In the spring, they look for wild trees 1. They only use a small number of flowers 1. They skip the rest.

Time of day matters to the bees too. They have a strict daily schedule. Bees like to collect pollen early 2. They do this in the morning 2. Later in the afternoon, they switch jobs. They start looking for nectar instead 2. They visit many bright flowers. For example, they love tall sunflowers 3. Many bees visit sunflowers for sweet nectar 3. Fewer bees visit them for dusty pollen 3.

Starting the Work Early

The bees suck up the sweet nectar. They use their long proboscis like a straw. The sweet liquid goes into their honey stomach. Fresh nectar is very watery. Bees need to make it thick and sticky. They start drying it right away! They do this while they fly home. They spit out a tiny drop of nectar. The wind dries the drop. Then they swallow it again. They do this over and over.

In plain terms: getting rid of extra water takes hard work.

Bees save a lot of energy. 4 They dry the nectar early. 4 They remove most of the extra water. 4 They do this before reaching the hive. 4 This makes the nectar twice as sweet. 4 It also makes the bee lighter. A lighter bee can fly home much faster.

Sharing the Sweet Catch

The forager bee lands at the hive. She is full of sweet food. She does not fill a cell yet. First, she passes it to a receiver bee. This sharing is called trophallaxis. The two bees touch their tongues together. The receiver bee drinks the nectar. Then she adds special enzymes from her body. These enzymes change the sugars inside the nectar. This step makes the nectar safe to store. The bees might pass the food again. They share it with a few more friends. Every single bee helps get the food ready. It is like a big game of catch.

Storing and Fanning

Next, a bee spits out the nectar. She puts it into a wax cell. The honeycomb cells look like hexagons. This six-sided shape is perfect. It holds the most food. It uses the least amount of wax. The nectar inside the cell is still wet. It needs even more drying. The bees stand over the open cells. They flap their wings very fast. This makes a strong breeze inside the hive. The breeze dries the honey even more. Soon, the honey is perfectly thick. Thick honey will never spoil. The bees cover the cell. They use a flat wax lid. This capped honeycomb is a safe food jar. The hive family now has plenty of food!

Key Terms

• Pollen 2 — Dusty yellow flower powder that bees collect mostly in the morning.
• Nectar 4 — Sweet, watery flower juice that bees collect and turn into thick honey.
• Trophallaxis — The way bees share food by passing it from mouth to mouth.
• Capped honeycomb — A wax cell filled with thick honey and covered with a flat wax lid.