Keeping the Bees

When King Tut's tomb was discovered and explored in 1922, one item found was a clay jar filled with honey. The ancient people apparently believed in an afterlife where you could get tea but you would have nothing to sweeten it with. "You gotta take it with you." they would say, but Tut seems to have left his honey back in the tomb. He also seems to have forgotten to take some cats and about a billion tons of gold.

Here is an interesting fact though: the honey could still be eaten. Honey never actually spoils. The jar in Tut's tomb said, "Best when used by, oh, whenever". The Tut's cats, on the other hand, were mildewy and completely inedible. But an amazing shelf life is not the only wonderful thing about honey. Of all the human foods produced by semi-domesticated flying insects, honey is by far one of the stickiest.

The specific flying insects we are talking about here are bees. Honeybees have had a tough year this year. Many hives around the world have died off or disappeared. Perhaps you are saying, "Good. Less bees out there to sting me." You should know however, that most of the stings you have experienced in your life were not caused by honeybees at all. They were actually caused by your eight-year old nephew behind the tree with his slingshot. Even if it wasn't him (and we know it was) it was most likely a wasp or a hornet.

Last spring I got myself a couple of hives, so now I am a beekeeper. The scientific name for a beekeeper is apiarist, or ape-man for short. The little critters are fascinating to watch and they are always busy. They go from flower to flower all day looking for a pollen or perhaps a nectar. When they find one they take it back to their queen who thanks them, and then turns it over to Parliament or maybe the House of Lords. Then I guess they can vote on it. The bees that do no work around the hive or lift a finger to care for the pupae are known as 'males'. They are also called drones, because they just go on and on about whatever sports are popular among them.