are always accustomed to associate the hum of the bee-hive with the farm-house and flower-garden, and to consider those industrious little animals as connected with the busy haunts of man, and I am told that the wild bee is seldom to be met with at any great distance from the frontier They have been the heralds of civilization, steadfastly preceding it as it advanced from the Atlantic borders, and some of the ancient settlers of the West pretend to give the very year when the honeybee first crossed the Mississippi The Indians with surprise found the mouldering trees of their forests suddenly teeming with ambrosial sweets, and nothing, I am told, can exceed the greedy relish with which they banquet for the first time upon this unbought luxury of the wilderness For those of us who buy our luxury in jars, this initial sense of wonder is worth reimagining Transforming Nectar into Honey In the hive, the bees concentrate the nectar to the point that it will resist bacteria and molds and so keep until it is needed “House bees” pump the nectar in and out of themselves for 15 or 20 minutes, repeatedly forming a thin droplet under their proboscises from which water can evaporate, until the water content of the nectar has dropped to 50 or 40% The bees then deposit the concentrated nectar in a thin film on the honeycomb, which is a waxy network of hexagonal cylinders about 0.20 inch/5 mm across, built up from the secretions of the wax glands of young workers Here, with workers keeping the hive air in continuous motion by fanning their wings, the nectar loses more moisture, until it’s less than 20% water This process, known as “ripening,” takes about three weeks The bees then fill the honeycomb cells to capacity with fully ripe honey and cap them with a layer of wax The ripening of honey involves both ...Transforming Nectar into Honey In the hive, the bees concentrate the nectar to the point that it will resist bacteria and molds and so keep until it is needed “House bees” pump the nectar in and out of themselves for 15 or... under their proboscises from which water can evaporate, until the water content of the nectar has dropped to 50 or 40% The bees then deposit the concentrated nectar in a thin film on the honeycomb, which is a waxy network... on the honeycomb, which is a waxy network of hexagonal cylinders about 0.20 inch/5 mm across, built up from the secretions of the wax glands of young workers Here, with workers keeping the hive air in continuous motion by fanning their wings, the nectar loses more