Improvement Era, 1933 by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Religion

The Honey Bee 1 By Don M. Rees

Instructor, Zoology Department, University of Utah

PROBABLY no other animal could represent the activities of this wonderful organization (Bee-Hive Girls) so well as that efficient insect-the honey bee. The importance of such a statement can only partly be realized when we consider that there are approximately one million described species of animals in the world, and more than half of all these animals are true insects. The honey bee is one of this large group of insects. Many insects are decidedly injurious to man, in carrying diseases of man and animal, and in destroying stored products and growing crops. It is estimated that one-tenth of all the crops grown in the United States are annually destroyed by insects. Many insects, however, are beneficial; in fact, we are dependent on insects for the fertilization of some plants, for silk, some dyes, and shellac; and from our friend the bee we obtain beeswax and honey. The honey bee, perhaps, is directly the most beneficial insect to man. It also shares another distinction with the silkworm, as the only insects that have been domesticated by man.

When we speak of bees, though there are many different kinds, we generally refer to the honey bee. This is because of man's long, intimate and pleasant association with this little industrious worker. Man's natural craving for sweets brought about his association with bees, as honey, until quite recently, was the only obtainable substance containing sugar in concentrated form. It is not surprising, then, that man's interest in the honey bee dates back to prehistoric times. Probably man at first was like the bears, a systematic robber of wild bees nests, later becoming an apiarist by inducing the bees to live near his dwelling in hollow logs, empty containers or earthen vessels. Savage tribes keep bees by similar methods today. In fact, within their geographic range bees have been kept by all races of people as far back as we have any written record of man. The honey bee is found inscribed on Egyptian possessions as early as 3500 B.C. We even know the price of strained honey under some of the Pharaohs. It was about five cents a quart.

Beekeeping has always stimulated the wonder and admiration of man. Primitive observers concluded that the bee was a superior creature because it lived in societies like men, but with its social relationships more harmonious than his. Its tireless industry, rapid flight, love of flowers, avoidance of unclean things, the attachment of the workers to the queen (regarded until recently as the king), its ability to produce wax and honey, two substances of great value to man-these and many other desirable characteristics caused the bee to be regarded as a divine being. Some maintained that the honey bee was a survivor of the mythical golden age; others believed that the bee had voluntarily escaped from the Garden of Eden and had been allowed, by God, to remain to sweeten man's bitter lot on earth.

The honey bee came, in the course of time, to symbolize all of the virtues.

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