Zen Botanika

Great info on drones. 🐝🐝

I received a great question regarding why worker bees have to feed drones (male bees).

Here's why:

1. Anatomy
Drones do not have functional mouthparts capable of collecting or processing food like worker bees do. They lack the specialized tongue (proboscis) used by workers to sip nectar, and they also don't have the ability to produce enzymes needed to digest or process food on their own.

2. No Foraging Role
Drones do not forage or perform any hive duties. Their only role is to mate with a virgin queen. Since they don’t work, they don’t gather or prepare their own food. Instead, they rely entirely on the worker bees for nourishment.

3. Colony Priorities
In a healthy colony during the spring and summer, worker bees will feed drones willingly, especially when the colony is preparing for mating season. However, come fall or during times of scarcity, drones are expelled or starved, since they are no longer useful and become a burden to the colony.

So, the short answer is:
👉 Drones are biologically dependent on worker bees for food because they lack the tools and roles to feed themselves or contribute to hive labor.
2025 copyright Bee Haven
Let me know if you'd like a comparison chart between workers, drones, and the queen!

Healthy natural honey medicine 🍯 🐝
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DE2YcqVh2n9/?igsh=dzYzcTRrdnk2YnNq

Another worthy repost as I continue traveling cross country—people LOVE this recipe and for anyone who didn’t get to experience fire honey yet: it’s amazing:I’m so happy so many people are enjoying this recipe. I really hope that it can help many others. It’s called fire honey and it’s one of the easiest things you can make at home with things you most likely have in your spice cabinet already. This can be helpful for so many things, including boosting your immune system, helping with coughs colds, sore throats, congestion pain and inflammation digestive issues, bloating, nausea, acid reflux, and it can also help boost the metabolism . My favorite way to take it is with green tea 1 teaspoon of the honey with the tea or you can just add it to warm water or you can take it by itself, but I actually do not recommend that as it is almost too spicy by itself for anyone who is sensitive to spice. You can store this on your countertop or in your pantry. You can also put it in the refrigerator, but there’s really no need to do so . This can last several months to a year or more. This is not medical advice, and I am not a medical professional. #HolisticRemedies #NaturalRemedies #ColdAndFluSeason #HolisticHealth.

Meet Boneco, the Apiarist Donkey! He lives with his owner Manual Juraci Vieira in the small town of Intatira, Brazil. Beekeeping is hard labour as a full super can weigh in excess of 10kg. So when it is harvesting time 4-6 supers is quite a load to cart around.

Manual and his fellow beekeepers used wheelbarrows to help with the heavy load. Until one day, a friend suggested to make Boneco his very own Donkey Beekeeping suit!!

It took Manual just over two weeks to make Boneco’s customized, protective suit by hand !!
Boneco’s help is invaluable to Manual as he helps to transport full supers across uneven terrain.
Manual says that Boneco appeared to be very content in his beekeeper suit, and that they are very good friends. Let’s hope Boneco receives his sweet reward every day for his supportive beekeeping services !!

Leer meer oor byeboerdery. Onderhoud met Hans Steenpoorte, een van Gauteng se bekendste byeboere.

Wat verg dit om 'n heuningboer te wees? - Driesestig Hans Steenpoorte vertel vir Martelize Brink van heuningboerdery, heuning wat ryp is, en die invloed van reën op die heuningoes.

European honey is 50% adulterated and honey for sale in German supermarkets up to 80% adulterated! Buy honey from your beekeeper friends only!

ALMOST HALF OF THE HONEY ON THE EUROPEAN MARKET IS FAKE

The warning comes from the European Beekeeping Association (EBA): almost half of the honey sold on the European market is fake. Beekeepers warn that the sector is at risk and are calling on the political authorities to introduce legislation to monitor the quality of the product.

The National Federation of Portuguese Beekeepers joined the appeal launched by the EBA, which in a statement translated into 15 languages warns of the risks of consuming fake and its impact on the agricultural sector.

EBA STATEMENT
EBA is fighting for almost 400,000 beekeepers – Press release EBA 15th October 2024:

" Some time ago, the European Commission announced that almost 50% of the honey on the market is fake. These data should be more than an alarm for politicians, who ares the only ones that can regulate this with appropriate legislation. At the initiative of Slovenia, the European Commission changed the directive on honey, and soon honey will have to be labeled with the country of origin. In addition, it has set itself the goal of defining a harmonized method for determining fakes and also defining reference laboratories, but unfortunately this is all too slow, as it should only be in three years.

The latest data show that the proportion of fake honey has increased. The European Professional Beekeepers Association – (EPBA) did a survey in Germany and experienced a real SHOCK, as approx. 80% of the honey in hypermarkets is fake, it was the same in Serbia.

Beekeeping will not survive unfair competition from fake honey. Therefore, it is high time that we all act and cooperate, first in line are European politicians, to take strict measures against fake honey, to IMMEDIATELY establish coordinated methods of detecting fakes and reference laboratories. The method MUST be such that it will be followed by inspection in all European countries and will be able to eliminate all fake honey from the market immediately!

We all need to make consumers aware of this problem, because we consume honey to strengthen our health, and fake honey sometimes only harms it. That is why the call goes out to consumers in Europe; "We Europeans choose European bee products, preferably from the local environment or at least from our country or at least from Europe!"
All beekeeping organizations in Europe must join forces for the same goal. Unfortunately, there will be no success without cooperation and joint performance.

The European Beekeeping Association EBA is open to cooperation with everyone, our only goal is the protection of beekeepers and consumers!

IN PORTUGAL
Portugal has 11,200 beekeepers, spread across five regions: North, Centre, Lisbon and Tagus Valley, Alentejo, Algarve and islands. However, the majority are non-professional beekeepers and around 10% have more than half of the country's hives, mostly concentrated in the Algarve. They produce honey and other derivatives, such as pollen and royal jelly, and also provide services to farmers by taking hives to the fields to help pollinate crops.

Portugal is, however, an example at European level, as it was a pioneer in labelling the origin of honey. “It will now be common practice in Europe”, because the industry used to write on the label “mixture of honey from various origins without mentioning the country”.

https://ebaeurope.eu/beekeeping-cannot-survive/