Honeybee Trivia

• Honey has been delighting humans for over 40 centuries. In ancient Egypt taxes were paid with honey. In early Greece and Rome honey symbolized fertility, love, and beauty. In the Bible this sublime nectar is called "the heavenly food".
• North American Indians called honeybees "white man flies" because Colonists brought them from Europe.
• An estimated 211,600 beekeepers maintain apiaries in the U.S.
• South Dakota, North Dakota, Florida, and California being the biggest honey producers.
• Utah is known as the Beehive State.
• An estimated 3.2 million colonies are in the U.S.
• The average honeybee can fly at a speed of 15 miles per hour.
• A hive of bees must fly 55,000 miles to produce a pound of honey.
• It would take approximately one ounce of honey to fuel a bee's flight around the earth.
• An average worker bee makes about 1/12th of a teaspoon of honey in her lifetime.
• To make honey, bees drop the collected nectar into the honeycomb and then evaporate it by fanning their wings.
• Honeybees dance to communicate the direction and distance of nectar sources.
• The fructose in honey makes it sweeter than sugar. At 21 calories a teaspoon it is one and a half times sweeter than sugar.
• Honey makes baked goods brown faster, and improves their shelf life.
• Honey varies in color from almost clear to very dark, depending on the floral source and it's location, as well as the climate.