Beekeeping
[4] At least 10,000 years ago, humans began to attempt to maintain colonies of wild bees in artificial hives made from hollow logs, wooden boxes, pottery vessels, and woven straw baskets known as skeps.
[9] On the walls of the sun temple of Nyuserre Ini from the Fifth Dynasty before 2,422 BCE, workers are depicted blowing smoke into hives as they remove honeycombs.
[13] Thirty intact hives made of straw and unbaked clay were discovered in the ruins of the city, dating from about 900 BCE, by archaeologist Amihai Mazar.
[14][15][16] In ancient Greece, in Crete and Mycenae, there existed a system of high-status apiculture that is evidenced by the finds of hives, smoking pots, honey extractors and other beekeeping paraphernalia in Knossos.
[20] The ancient Maya domesticated a species of stingless bee, which they used for several purposes, including making balché, a mead-like alcoholic drink.
Together, Huber and Burnens dissected bees under the microscope, and were among the first to describe the ovaries and spermatheca (sperm store) of queens, as well as the penis of male drones.
Wildman also describes the initiatives of others in designing hives for the preservation of bees when taking the harvest, citing reports from Brittany in the 1750s due to the Comte de la Bourdonnaye.
[33] In the 19th century, changes in beekeeping practice were completed through the development of the movable comb hive by the American Lorenzo Lorraine Langstroth, who was the first person to make practical use of Huber's earlier discovery of a specific spatial distance between the wax combs, later called the bee space, which bees do not block with wax but keep as a free passage.
This enables the beekeeper to slide any frame out of the hive for inspection without harming the bees or the comb; and protecting the eggs, larvae and pupae in the cells.
Regional variations of hive were developed according to climate, floral productivity and reproductive characteristics of the subspecies of native honey bees in each bio-region.
Notable innovators of modern beekeeping include: Petro Prokopovych used frames with channels in the side of the woodwork; these were packed side-by-side in stacked boxes.
Despite being blind, Huber discovered a large amount of information about the queen bee's mating habits and her contact with the rest of the hive.
[48] Franz Hruschka was an Austrian/Italian military officer who in 1865 invented a simple machine for extracting honey from the comb by means of centrifugal force.
His original idea was to support combs in a metal framework and then spin them within a container to collect honey that was thrown out by centrifugal force.
This meant honeycombs could be returned to a hive empty and undamaged, saving the bees a vast amount of work, time and materials.
His company sold products worldwide and his book How to Keep Bees & Sell Honey, encouraged a boom in beekeeping following World War II.
[53][54] Ahmed Zaky Abushady (1892–1955) was an Egyptian poet, medical doctor, bacteriologist, and bee scientist, who was active in England and Egypt in the early twentieth century.
Hanging-frame hive designs include Langstroth, the British National, Dadant, Layens, and Rose, which differ in size and number of frames.
The honey house can be a portable trailer, allowing the beekeeper to move hives to a site and provide pollination services.
Some beekeeping supply sources also sell commercial fuels like pulped paper, compressed cotton and aerosol cans of smoke.
Anaesthesia experiments done using smoke from pyrolysis of L. wahlbergii, human hair and chicken feathers showed no difference in long-term mortality of anesthetized honeybees and non-treated bees in the same hive.
Beekeepers have high levels of antibodies, mainly Immunoglobulin G, caused by a reaction to the major antigen of bee venom, phospholipase A2 (PLA).
[74] The extra insulation is believed to reduce the amount of honey the bees consume and makes it easier for them to maintain the hive's temperature.
[78] Practitioners of "natural beekeeping" tend to use variations of the top-bar hive, which is a simple design that retains the concept of having a movable comb without the use of frames or a foundation.
This may be done for reasons of space and monitoring, or in the cooler months, when large commercial beekeepers may move colonies to "wintering" warehouses with fixed temperature, light, and humidity.
[96] Royal jelly dramatically alters the growth and development of the larva so after metamorphosis and pupation, it emerges from the cell as a queen bee.
[92] The common agents of disease that affect adult honey bees include fungi, bacteria, protozoa, viruses, parasites and poisons.
Common honeybee predators include large animals such as skunks and bears, which seek the hive's honey and brood, as well as adult bees.
The event, which took place in London, United Kingdom, featured entries from over 50 countries and highlighted the diverse range of honey varieties produced worldwide.
[113] The fraudulent entries contained: This incident has raised concerns about the integrity of honey production and labeling practices in the global market.
