Fertilized eggs become female or worker
bees and unfertilized eggs become male or
drone bees. When the queen dies or becomes
unproductive, the other bees will ‘make’ a new
queen by selecting a young larva and feeding
it a diet of royal jelly. Royal jelly is made of
pollen, which is chewed up and mixed with a
chemical secreted from a gland in the nursing
bees’ heads.
This milk or pollen mush is fed to all the
larvae for the first two days of their lives. The
larvae chosen to become queen continues to
eat only royal jelly and grows one and a half
times larger than an ordinary bee.
Honey is a popular commodity. Barbe senior
said, “There is a demand for honey and the
by-products are unlimited.” By-products include
everything from hand cream to candles, honey
sauces and wines.
But perhaps the most important benefit of
bees is pollination. Pollinators are a critical
link in our food system. More than 85 percent
of earth’s plant species – many of which
compose some of the most nutritional parts
of our diet – require pollination to exist. Fiftytwo percent of grocery stores’ produce mix has
to be pollinated - including apples, avocados,
broccoli, cantaloupe, carrots, cauliflower, celery,
cucumbers, kale and greens, just to name a few.
In a quote some attribute to Albert Einstein, it
is said, “if bees disappear from the earth, man
would have no more than four years to live.” So
the next time you cringe at the thought of a bee
sting, think instead about all the delicioius, vital
foods we would be without if it weren’t for these
amazing little creatures!
Fun Facts
• Bees from a single hive fly
55,000 miles to make one
jar of honey
• Honeybees flap their wings
230 times per second
• Bees communicate using
a dance language that tells
the direction, distance and
quality of food
• Honey is worth about $14.6
billion to U.S. agriculture
• Honeybees pollinate more
than 80 percent of the food
eaten in the U.S.
West Virginia Farm Bureau News 13