ARTS,CRAFTS AND TRADITIONAL INDUSTRIES

Bees are four-winged insects with a string. They collect nectar and pollen from flowers to produce honey and wax. A bee-hive is a structure where bees live - their home. Bees make a substance called propolis by collecting resin from bark and leaf buds, and use it to line the inside of their hives or, in the wild, their nests. Honey can be eaten as it is, or as in ingredient of foods such as cake and confectionery; it is also used in making a drink called mead. Beeswax is used to make candles, soap, polishes, and cosmetics such as cold cream, cleansing and protective creams, and depilatory creams. Propolis is used in medicinal products such as throat lozenges, tinctures, ointments, and cough syrup, or as a health product to improve immunity. The oldest record of humans collecting honey is a prehistoric cave painting from Spain, about 15,000 years old, which shows a man climbing a cliff to access a bees' nest. Bee-keeping is recorded in antiquity. The honeycomb is the internal structure of the bee-hive: it is a densely packed matrix of hexagonal cells made of beeswax. Honey is stored in the upper part of the comb; beneath it are the rows of pollen-storage cells, then the worker-brood cells and then the drone-brood cells. The queen cells are normally built at the lower edge of the comb. Thus in the hives there are three types of bees: the queen, which lays the eggs; the males or drones; and the workers, which feed the hive. In the wild, bees construct natural hives made up of multiple honeycombs, usually with a single entrance. They are situated e.g. in tree branches, hollow trees, cliffs, caves, or rock cavities. Collecting wild honey can be dangerous. For example, in the mangrove swamps of the Sunderbans forest of Bangladesh and West Bengal (India) honey gatherers risk attack from the Royal Bengal Tiger. Having located a bees' nest among the tree-branches, the honey gatherers use torches made of rags or leaves and twigs to create smoke, which forces the bees to fly away. To protect themselves, the hunters cover their faces with cotton cloth, but this is inadequate. While some gatherers climb the tree and cut into the honeycomb (leaving some for future harvesting), others on the ground burst crackers and blow horns to scare away any tigers in the area. Honey flowing from the cuts in the comb is collected in bamboo baskets, which are taken away by boat. In Nepal, in the forested foothills of the Himalayas, honey collectors climb up huge cliffs using bamboo ladders to access hives in crevices in the rock. As soon as a nest is located the honey hunter hoists his ladder and lights a fire. The bees, panicked by the smoke, launch a massive attack before giving up. As soon as the attack diminishes in intensity, the gatherer climbs the ladder and extracts the honey, risking a fall. With only improvised protection, gatherers' faces are often stung by the bees. Artificial hives can be of traditional or modern type. Traditional hives can be made from mud, clay, pottery, tiles, and bee gums; modern ones of wood or plastic. The basic components of a hive are: a) stand: to prevent damp and rotting wood, the hive is placed on a raised stand or on bricks; b) floor or bottom board: usually a flat wooden surface, with an entrance for the bees to get into the hive; c) brood box: the main home of the bees, where the queen bee lays her eggs; d) super: the uppermost box where honey is stored; e) queen excluder: this prevents the queen from laying eggs on top of the bees' honey store; f) roof: usually of wood, it protects against bad weather and prevents unwanted intrusions. There are some variations on this basic structure. Some artificial hives have an inner cover, some an outer cover. Frames and foundations can be shorter or longer; some have handles. The commonest types of hives which are currently on the market are the Langstroth, the National, the WBC, the Commercial, the Warre, the Top Bar, the Smith, and the Dadant. The beekeeper waits until the bees have filled the supers with honey and capped the honey-cells. Then he extracts the honey. The bees must be removed from the supers before the honey is extracted. This is usually done by one of the following methods: a) using the escape board, which is placed under the super. It is essential for the super to be closely and tightly covered with a crown board or cloth; b) using `fume boards' to apply chemicals such as benzaldehyde or butric anhydride; the bees recoil from the board and so leave the super; c) brushing away the bees, by smoking them after removing the roof and the crown board; d) using a mechanical blower to blow the bees out of the super. Honey is then extracted from the frame by spinning or scraping. For spinning, a hand or electric extractor is used and a spoon is used to scrape the honey off the frame. A sharp knife is used to cut out the comb and to remove the wax capping over the surface on both sides of the frame. Finally, for a clear honey, a filter is used before bottling. The extraction process is messy: a suitable room with a water supply and sink is necessary. After honey, wax is the main product. It is extracted either by using a solar extractor or by using heat, water and fabric (burlap) bags. The solar extractor is an insulated container with a double-glazed lid. Wax from the hive is cut into pieces and put into the extractor. The lid then closed and the extractor is placed in the sun. When the temperature rises to 145/147°F, the wax melts and runs down the tray into the container after passing through a filter. The other method is to place small pieces of washed comb into a burlap bag and then in a cooking pot, which is heated until the comb melts and the wax escapes the bag and floats on top of the water. To achieve the highest level of purity it is necessary to repeat the process several times. Nowadays various types of stainless steel boilers are available commercially. What are the health issues? To protect themselves, the hunters cover their faces with cotton cloth, but this is inadequate. While some gatherers climb the tree and cut into the honeycomb (leaving some for future harvesting), others on the ground burst crackers and blow horns to scare away any tigers in the area. Honey flowing from the cuts in the comb is collected in bamboo baskets, which are taken away by boat.