The best known hive product is honey, which is valued both as a food and as a folk remedy. Beeswax is another major hive product, though neither its uses nor its value are as widely known as those of honey. Honey and beeswax are products in any beekeeping project, and their production and marketing mesh well with most small-farm situations.

Other hive products are pollen, royal jelly, propolis, bee venom, bee brood, and bees (queens and packages). All of these involve either special management practices and equipment or highly specialized markets. Their production and marketing are not practical for beginning beekeepers.

Honey is the primary hive product. it is basically nectar from which the bees have evaporated most of the water content. In converting the nectar to honey, the bees also add enzymes which serve mainly to break complex sugar molecules down into simple sugar molecules.

The characteristic tastes and properties of honey depend upon the floral sources of the nectar. Thus honey from different regions and from different periods during the nectar flow is different in taste and physical properties. Generally, darker honey is stronger-tasting.

Nutritionally, honey is virtually pure carbohydrate. It contains only trace amounts of other substances. The greatest nutritional attribute of honey is that it consists of simple sugars. These sugars do not need to be digested, but are assimilated directly by the body. This makes honey a quick energy source.

Honey is a natural sweetener. It can be eaten as is or used in any type of cooking or to sweeten beverages. In some regions, honey is traditionally used to prepare special foods for certain occasions. it is also widely used in folk medicine. Honey has a long history as a wound dressing, for example. Its bacteriostatic property (inability to allow bacterial growth) helps to control infections.

Honey is also used in some areas to make alcoholic beverages such as mead or honey wine. In parts of Africa, honey beer is a traditional and popular beverage.

Honey is a widely known and used product. Yet in marketing honey, it is important that consumers have confidence that they are getting what they are paying for. Thus the most important aspect of honey processing is maintaining quality. A good quality honey in which potential users have faith is essential to establish and maintain marketing outlets.

Absence of foreign material is the main criterion of quality in honey. Bits of wax or propolis, pollen, brood, dirt, dead bees, or ashes can contaminate honey during extraction or processing. But the most insidious honey contaminant is sugar water deliberately added by dishonest beekeepers. Good beekeepers who strive to avoid contaminating their honey either deliberately or in processing will be rewarded with a steady market for their product.

For harvesting honey, use combs that contain only honey and have at least two-thirds of the cells sealed. Preferably use only lighter-colored combs. Dark comb contains propolis, which can impart a strong taste to the honey. Using only honey comb prevents contamination from brood and minimizes the pollen in the final product.

All honey contains some pollen. Too much pollen in honey is mostly an aesthetic concern. A high pollen content gives honey a cloudy appearance and can also give it a stronger taste. Pressed honey, or honey that is removed by squeezing it from the comb, has a higher pollen content than extracted honey. (Extracted honey is removed from the comb by centrifugal force. The liquid honey is spun out of the comb, and the solid pollen remains.)

Water content is also important to the quality of the honey. All honey contains yeasts. To prevent the growth of the naturally-occurring yeasts and the subsequent fermentation of the honey, the water content of the honey should be below 19 per cent. Such honey is said to be mature or ripened. Nectar that has a water content above 19 per cent is called green or unripened honey. Yeasts cannot grow in ripe honey because of osmotic imbalance; there is no water available to the yeast cells for growth.

Once the bees have ripened the honey, they seal the cells of the comb. Use only honey comb that has most of the cells sealed for harvesting honey. This is the beekeeper's assurance that the honey is ripe and will be self-preserving. Ripe honey stored in closed containers in cool places will keep for long periods. it does not need refrigeration.

Pressed honey is the type most easily produced in small-scale projects. To minimize the pollen content of the honey, check the comb for stored pollen before squeezing out the honey. (The pollen can be seen by looking through the comb toward the sun or a light.) Areas of comb that contain large amounts of pollen can be cut out. Remove the honey from the comb that contains pollen separately, and use it for home consumption. (The pollen and comb can also be eaten. Pollen is a nutritious food.)

After the honey is removed from the combs, put it in a sealed container. Honey is hygroscopic; it absorbs moisture from the air. If left exposed in humid environments, the moisture content will rise and the honey will ferment. Dead bees or brood in honey can also raise the moisture content as well as aesthetically contaminate the honey.

That is why adding water to increase the volume of the honey is a no-win situation. It quickly leads to fermented honey and dissatisfied customers. Adding sugar water does not cause a problem with fermentation provided the sugar concentration is high enough, but it does lead to dissatisfaction among the users of the honey.

People who buy honey and pay honey prices want honey. They do not want sugar water mixed in the honey. Unfortunately, extending honey with sugar water is practiced by some beekeepers and by some honey sellers in local markets. Even if the beekeepers are not involved in the adulteration, they get the ultimate blame and lose the most, for it is their product which loses credibility.

Selling honey in the comb is one way to assure buyers of a quality product. Comb honey is sealed in the hive by the bees, therefore buyers can be confident that the honey has not been adulterated with sugar water. Marketing honey in the comb is especially apt for beekeepers using the KTBH or other intermediate technology systems.

A common misconception is that granulated or crystallized honey is proof of adulteration with sugar water. Honey can granulate whether or not it has been adulterated. Honey is a supersaturated sugar solution, thus crystallization is normal. Some honey from certain floral sources is especially prone to crystallize.

Crystalized honey is not spoiled. It can be liquefied by heating it slowly. This is best done by putting the container of honey in warm water since heating honey directly can caramelize the sugars, giving it a burnt taste. Heating honey does change the taste, so it is best to avoid the use of heat when processing honey for marketing.

In the bulk processing and packing of honey, heating is sometimes used to destroy sugar crystals. This prevents crystallization when the honey is bottled. (This heating is not a pasteurization process. Pasteurization kills off bacteria. This is not necessary with ripe honey since these organisms cannot grow in a sugar solution with such a low water content.)

The heating process is carefully controlled and regulated. (The temperature is maintained at 63 degrees C for thirty minutes.) Sophisticated equipment is needed since excess heat alters honey and lowers its quality. Thus for small-scale beekeeping, avoid using heat for processing.

Heat is also used to process wax and to recover the residue of honey left in the combs after they have been squeezed or drained. Use this honey for home consumption, as its quality is lower.

In rare instances, bees produce honey that is poisonous to humans. This occurs in a very few regions. It sometimes results when nectar secretion fails in the usual bee forage due to abnormal environmental conditions. The bees are then forced to collect nectar from plants which they would normally not visit.

All of the honey produced by the colony during the year would not be poisonous. Only honey made from the poisonous nectar would be harmful. This fact is often recognized by local beekeepers, and honey produced during certain periods is not harvested.

Normally, poisonous honey is not produced every year. By knowing the source ' of the poisonous nectar and noting when bees are visiting the flowers, the beekeeper can prevent the possibility of poisoning.

Various tests are available to bulk buyers of honey to check on the purity and quality of honey. If a bee project develops to the point where it is selling to these buyers, quality will make the difference in the price received as well as whether or not they will be able to sell at all.

Beeswax is a hive product whose value is not recognized at all in some areas, while ' in others it is considered more valuable than honey.

The wax of the western hive bee (Apis mellifera) differs from the beeswax produced by the Asian species of honey bee (A. dorsata, A. florea, and A. cerana). Wax of the Asian species is called Ghedda wax and is less desirable than that of the western hive bee for international marketing purposes.

Pure beeswax is harder and has a higher melting point (64 degrees C) than most other waxes. These properties make it more desirable for certain applications. Beeswax is used industrially in cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, polishes, and candles. Uses for beeswax on a small scale include:

• candle-making

• lost-wax casting of metals

• wax printing and batiking of cloth

• polishes for wood and leather

• strengthening and waterproofing thread for sewing

• treatment of cracked hooves of domestic animals

• making of comb foundation or wax starter ,-trips for beehives.

Many of these crafts and practices already exist, and can furnish a ready outlet for beeswax. Check with people engaged in these activities to find leads in developing a local market for beeswax.

(See Appendix D, Uses for Beeswax.)

All old combs and pieces of wax should be saved for rendering into wax blocks. Old combs should be rendered separately from newer ones since the newer combs yield a higher quality wax. Dark combs contain propolis and cocoons which lower the quality of the wax.

Comb stored in pieces is highly susceptible to wax moth damage. With a solar wax melter, small pieces of comb can be rendered easily as they are cut from the hive and made into blocks. There is no need to accumulate a lot of comb to render at one time as is the case with rendering wax with hot water.

Comb to be rendered can be stored for short periods in sealed plastic bags with moth balls (paradichloro-benzene or PDB) to prevent wax moth damage. Check the stored comb periodically for evidence of wax moth larvae. The PDB only prevents the adults from laying eggs, it does nothing to developing larvae. Stronger fumigants can be used, but these are generally impractical for small-farmers.

Pollen has only recently been thought of as a hive product for human consumption. Previously, it was collected by beekeepers during periods of heavy pollen flows and then fed to the colonies at the beginning of build-up periods to stimulate brood-rearing.

The interest in pollen as human food is usually found only in large urban centers where there is a specialized market for natural foods. From a nutritional viewpoint, pollen is a rich source of proteins, vitamins, and minerals, though economically it cannot compete with conventional sources of these nutrients. The many medicinal claims for pollen have not be substantiated, and some people have even developed allergic reactions to ingested pollen.

Pollen is collected by forcing the returning foragers to pass through a five-mesh (five holes per 2.5 cm) wire grid. The pollen pellets are scraped from the pollen baskets on the workers' hind legs and fall into a collecting tray covered with a smaller mesh wire to prevent the bees from retrieving the pollen. Several designs of pollen trap are used. (See sources in Appendix A.)

Pollen collecting is not recommended for beginning or most small-scale beekeepers. The colony needs pollen to rear brood, thus only limited amounts can be removed or the colony will become weak. This entails monitoring the colony closely. Trapping pollen is more efficient in areas where there are intense flows. In most areas of the tropics, pollen collecting is difficult since the flows are weaker and the yields are low.

Pollen also spoils quickly. The traps should be emptied often (daily in humid weather) to prevent pollen from molding. Once the pollen is collected, it must be quickly dried or frozen. Direct sunlight and too much heat reduce the nutritional value and quality of the pollen, thus special facilities are needed for processing and storage.

The problems involved in collecting and processing pollen, coupled with its limited market, make it an impractical product for most small-scale beekeepers.

Bee brood is a potential hive product for local use. It can be used as animal food or as human food in areas where insects are accepted in the human diet,

Brood is the developing adults of the colony, so only drone brood should be used. Cut out the areas of comb that contain the brood and remove the brood from the comb by shaking or picking it out. Older larvae are easier to remove since the cells do not have to be uncapped.

After the brood is removed, the comb can be rendered for the wax. Comb containing brood can also be given directly to chickens. They will remove the larvae and pupae, though the beeswax will be lost as they destroy the comb.

For human food, the brood can be eaten raw or dried, or skewered and roasted.

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Pollen, royal jelly, propolis, bee venom, and bees (queens and packages) are hive products which call for experience in beekeeping and specialized skills in production and marketing. Production of these is not as a rule for the beginning beekeeper nor for most small-scale farmers.

More information on these products is available in some of the sources listed in Appendix A.

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