The ABCs of bees

It takes 1,152 bees to travel 112,000 miles and visit 4.5 million flowers.

So says Chris Maxwell of Wild Creek Bee Farm, Lehighton, who recently spoke to members of the Palmerton Historical Society.

Maxwell shared his knowledge about bees, and all of the work involved in making just 16 ounces of honey.

He said when his family moved to Slatington, there were few kids his age, but there were fields of wildflowers. Today, Maxwell has from 600 to 1,000 colonies of bees that get moved to wherever the farmers need pollination.

The bees are an indicator species. He said you have to wonder what is going on when the pollinators are dying.

Maxwell said raw honey should never be heated over 120 degrees. It has an enzyme that may be destroyed. The raw honey may granulate but it never goes bad. Honey found from early Egypt is still edible.

He is disappointed that neither the Food and Drug Administration nor the Environmental Protection Association will define honey because then they would have to check the purity of imports. Imports sold as honey are often cut with corn syrup.

In cold weather bees can generate enough heat to keep the hive at 80 degrees. They constantly move in and out of a volleyball-sized cluster. The tops of hives should be insulated so no water forms and drips from condensation.

In spring the first pollen comes from the tulip poplar. As soon as there is pollen the queen bee begins laying eggs. If the bees huddle on the top cover, the hive is short of food. It has to be monitored because they may run out before the dandelion provides a good food source.

A queen will lay 2,000 to 3,000 eggs a day. When a dozen or so bees are fed royal jelly to create a new queen, she will have everything in her body to develop ovaries.

The first one hatched will sting the other cells and if two are born at the same time they will fight.

The queen bee does not have a barb on her stinger, so stinging does not mean death. However, if you get stung, the stinger will remain in your body and has to be scraped off not pulled out because it will force the toxin into your body.

There are 2,000 to 5,000 drone bees in a hive and a new queen will fly and the drones mate with her. After mating a drone will die.

When a worker bee finds a source of pollen and nectar it will do a dance that tells the remainder of the workers what direction and how far away the source is.

A queen can live five years, but the workers only live two weeks because they work themselves to death. When the wings become tattered they will fly away from the hive to die.

When a hive is too full the queen and her workers will send out scout bees to find a new suitable place to live. Pollen sticks to the bees and will get carried to the new site.

If the hive manager does not want a swarm the hive has to be enlarged so it does not get crowded. The older working bees are in charge of the hive.

Varrora mites have caused many hives to fail. The mites get a ride into a hive on the worker bees and they spread to the offspring by getting into an egg cell before it is sealed. The mites parasitize the bees and do the most damage in fall when queens are slowing egg production, preparing for winter.

To manage for mites Maxwell puts 250 bees in alcohol. When the jar is shaken the mites will fall off the bees. If there are more than 10 mites in one-half cup of bees it is a heavy infestation. Ascorbic acid can kill the mites and then it evaporates.

Last winter 45 percent of the bees in Pennsylvania died off. If we lose the bees we will lose a lot of food, said Maxwell.

Many food plants are protected by systemic pesticides.

The World Health Organization says Roundup causes cancer and autism. Monsanto makes Roundup that changes everything that grows. The foods the farmer raises are fed to animals and end up in human food. People may think they have a gluten allergy, but it may be from the chemicals.

The combination of several toxicities gang up on the bees and weaken and then kill them, causing colony collapse.

Other contaminants come from water in areas that are sprayed. Since bees are so small they have little tolerance for contaminants.

Maxwell said that the head of the Food and Drug Administration was a lawyer for Monsanto before accepting his new post and has since removed many regulations.

In other historical society business, the society had a surprise when a man came into the heritage center and said, "I bet you don't know me."

It was Bob Dunn, son of the former owner of the W.T. Grant store on Delaware Avenue. Palmerton. He is living in Michigan and looking for a place in Palmerton to come back home.