The Bee Honey - Gift of God

obmar · The Bee Honey - Gift of God

English Shakir: [16:68]
And your Lord revealed to the bee saying: Make hives in the mountains and in the trees and in what they build:

English Shakir: [16:69]
Then eat of all the fruits and walk in the ways of your Lord submissively. There comes forth from within it a beverage of many colours, in which there is healing for men; most surely there is a sign in this for a people who reflect.

obmar · Honey In Modern Therapeutics

Honey In Modern Therapeutics

Honey plays an insignificant part in our modern Materia Medial, though strained, clarified, borated and rose honey are listed in many pharmacopoeias. The mel depuratum (clarified honey) is rather an inadequate substance because it is subjected to heating and is filtered through cloth which also robs it of some mineral elements.

In lay, let us call it unscientific medicine, especially in the rural districts, however, honey is today a more popular nostrum than the medical profession would surmise. Physicians, with few ex ceptions, grin broadly at the mere mention of the medicinal and food merits of honey. Of course, the name honey sounds rather homely, almost dilettant. How much more knowledge and intelligence the term, cinchophen, for example, reveals. This sub-stance was widely advertised and the medical fraternity, conformably, employed it. It soon became so popular that the general public began to use it indiscriminately. After it had caused irreparable harm and many patients had died from its effect, the sale without a prescription was prohibited. This is only one in-stance. On the other hand, people will ignore good things which are within their reach.

Something should be done to induce the medical profession to look more carefully into the remedial and dietetic value of honey. On the European continent, where physicians are paid for keeping patients in good health, honey is freely used. It is time that American physicians should do likewise and obviate the possibility of a rather embarrassing accusation that instead of pre-venting disease, they prevent health. It is the physician's duty to help and to educate the public.

In antiquity and all through the Middle Ages, honey was an important medicine. Up to the end of the last century, it still held the place of honor in the service of Aesculapius. Only with the advent of the millions of patented and well-advertised domestic and imported whatnots was honey almost banished as a curative substance, the same fate which it suffered as a sweetening matter upon the introduction of refined sugar. Thanks to the simple country-folk and to the primitive races, honey is yet in its glory as a dispenser of health and as a valued remedy. Honey cures were popular in many European countries for the tired feeling caused by the so-called spring fever.

The consideration alone that a snake is pictured coiled around the stick of Aesculapius, eager to feast from a cup of honey, ought to be sufficient exhortation to medical men to be more interested in this substance. (Aesculapius, the god of Medicine, who not only healed the sick but restored the dead to life, held the snake sacred. The snake was the emblem of health and recovery. The snakes were fed on honey or honey cakes. Whoever entered the cave of Trophonius had to throw honey cake to the snakes (Pausanias IX. 39:5). Honey was also the favorite food of the fabled serpent, the guardian of the Acropolis (Herodot. VIII. 41). The snake of Aesculapius in Cos was given honey and honey cake (Herondas IV. 90; Virgil Aeneid IV. 484).

Among the Asiatic races, including the Chinese and the Hindu, and among the Egyptians, Arabs and the African tribes, honey is still considered an excellent protective food and a sovereign internal and external remedy. Amongst the Wa-Sania tribes, British East Africa, a mother's only nutriment for several days after the birth of a child is honey with hot water. A boy, after he has been circumcised (usually at the age of 3 or 4) is permitted only to consume honey and water for a week. Among the Nandis some honey is placed on the tongue of a child before circumcision. Honey is often combined by them with the bark and leaves of certain trees and plants. Among the rural population of the old countries, especially among the Greeks, Italians, Hungarians and all the Slavic races, honey is a popular home remedy. Their laxative medicines, likewise those for coughs, bronchitis, tuberculosis and other pulmonary ailments, contain honey. For respiratory troubles honey is often mixed with anis, pepper, horseradish, ginger, mustard and garlic. A glassful of warm milk with a table-spoonful of honey is used for bronchitis and debilitated conditions. Goat's milk or buttermilk and honey is a favored and popular remedy for tuberculosis. Goat's milk is most nutritious and very digestible. It is nearest to human milk. There are more vitamins, minerals, fats and proteins in goat's milk than in any other milk. In the East, Far East, Africa and in most European countries goat's milk is extremely popular. Recently there have been considerable efforts made in the United States to popularize goat raising.

The diuretic effect of honey which was well known in antiquity, is still employed in kidney and bladder involvements. In pyelitis (inflammation of the renal pelvis) honey increases the amount of urine and exerts a decided antiseptic effect. The patients quickly improve; the urine clears and loses its putrid odor. The laxative effect of honey in these cases is also of advantage. One of the author's correspondents (J. L. McD., of Marion, Indiana), wrote thus about the subject: "A bee-keeping friend of mine suffered from tuberculosis of the kidney and was given up by two doctors fifteen years ago. He got to eating honey and plenty of it and he is today as peppy as a youngster." Honey is an important ingredient of worm-cures. The African tribes also mix their tobacco and their aphrodisiac remedies with honey.

Among the so-called "civilized" communities we find some people who favor honey, especially for throat and bronchial ailments. During many years' professional contact with opera singers, the writer has found that they frequently resorted to honey for the treatment of their throat affections. They consider it an excellent demulcent and expectorant. Three parts of honey and one part of compound tincture of benzoin is popular among singers; so is an occasional gulp from a mixture of two ounces of honey, one ounce of lemon juice and an ounce of pure glycerin. Honey (125 gm.) and alum (25 gm.) added to one quart of water is a useful gargle. The mixture of honey and alum is highly valued for sore throat and ulcerations of the gums and mouth. Hot milk and honey make an excellent remedy for husky throats.

Another correspondent of the author (M. S. of Kansas City, Mo.) has written about the curative value of honey in pulmonary affection, as follows: "In 1925, I became ill and consulted several doctors, all of whom gave the verdict of active tuberculosis. After seven months, two doctors gave me up, and said that my only chance was to go West, which I could not afford to do. At a later date, they frankly informed me that I had only three months to live and insisted on sending me to Colorado. I was then living in Kansas City, Missouri, and had previously been engaged in cement and paving work. I managed to land a job in Nemaha County, Kansas, about 140 miles west of Kansas City. My work was to establish an apiary of one hundred colonies for a commercial orchard. I was to `batch' in a room in the apple house, which had a cement floor. Often it took all my strength to carry a gallon bucket of water from the well, one hundred feet away. In studying bees, I had learned the value of honey in driving out and destroying all germs in the human body. I used honey regularly and I worked to the limit of my strength. Three years later, the same doctors examined me and found only a few spots on my lungs. They absolutely refused to believe that I was the same person. Today, I take my place as an average man. I take care of two hundred fifty colonies of bees and a farm of twenty-five acres of land. The only help I have is about one month during the honey harvest. I don't know whether the honey cured me, or it was the fact that I was too lazy to crawl into my coffin, but I believe the honey and possibly the raw diet were the major factors of my recovery."

J. J. H., of Brownsville, Florida, reports that when his grand-mother was a young girl she was given up by her physicians as a hopeless consumptive. Someone prescribed a diet of honey and goat's milk, with the result that she lived to the age of eighty-eight and was free from illness during the rest of her lifetime.

M. D. A., of Old Forge, New York, is certainly a great admirer of honey. He writes: "Having kept bees and eaten honey for over thirty years, I can tell about my own experience and give also observations of other people who use honey exclusively for sweetening. I never have known a beekeeper who had any kind of kidney trouble. They all have a clear complexion, good eyesight and no lameness. Among my friends who eat honey and keep bees, there is no cancer or paralysis. My best remedy for a bee sting is to cover it with honey, even a deep burn will not scar if treated the same way. I have seen sour milk, whole wheat cracked for cereal, honey and butter do wonders in diet. I cured the cough of a great number of my friends, where other remedies failed, with this prescription:

4 tablespoonfuls of honey
1 teaspoonful of sulphur
5 drops of pure turpentine

Mix it, take half-teaspoonful two or three hours apart." The soporific effect of honey is par excellence. The French Voirnot advocated it for insomnia. Dr. Lorand (of Carlsbad) also recommends honey as a good hypnotic and reconstructive. D. Dumoulin, when eighty years old, commented, "Chaque soir, avant de me mettre au lit, je prends une cuiller â cafe de miel, soit pur, soit dans du lait chaud, et je dors comme â vingt ans." (Every night, before I go to bed I take a teaspoonful of honey, sometimes pure, other times in hot milk and I sleep like when twenty years old.) A tumblerful of hot water with one or two tablespoonfuls of ripe honey and the juice of half a lemon has been the author's favorite potion for nervous insomnia. This simple and inexpensive home remedy has been greatly appreciated by his patients and most of them have assured him that it is more helpful than (an infinite number of patented drugs could equitably replace these dots).

In digestive disturbances honey is of great value. Honey does not ferment in the stomach because, being an inverted sugar, it is easily absorbed and there is no danger of a bacterial invasion. The flavor of honey excites the appetite and helps digestion. The propoma of the ancients, made of honey, was a popular appetizer. For anemics, dyspeptics, convalescents and the aged, honey is an excellent reconstructive and tonic. In malnutrition, no food or drug can equal it. The laxative value of honey, on account of its lubricating effect, is well known. Its fatty acid content stimulates peristalsis. In gastric catarrh, hyperacidity, gastric and duodenal ulcers and gall bladder diseases honey is recommended by several eminent gastroenterologists.

Dr. Schacht, of Wiesbaden, claims to have cured many hope-less cases of gastric and intestinal ulcers with honey and without operations. It is rather unusual that a physician of standing has the courage and conviction to praise honey. The beekeepers and their friends know that honey will cure gastric and intestinal ulcerations, this distressing, prevalent and most dangerous malady, a precursor of cancer. But the news has not yet reached 99% of the medical profession. The remaining few physicians who know it, are afraid to suggest such an unscientific and plebeian remedy, for fear of being laughed at by their colleagues and scientifically inclined patients. You may read in almost every issue of apicultural papers the reports of correspondents regarding their experience with honey for gastric ulcers, after going through the medical mill for years without improvement, with-out even hope of ever getting cured. Then incidentally they meet a beekeeper or one of his converts and if they have courage and common sense (there are few) to heed the advice, they get well. It is disheartening for a physician to read such reports. For in-stance, a correspondent (A. L. T. of Omaha, Nebr.), writes in Gleanings in Bee Culture, February, 1931), "I have been a sufferer from ulcerated stomach for several years, part time in the hospital, part time in bed and nearly all the time in much pain. I noticed from the middle of September I was much better and gave no thought to the reason but kept up eating honey because I relished it. I had no attack since and it held good. . . ." It would fill a volume to assemble similar testimonials, praising particularly the curative value of honey in gastric and intestinal disorders, including ulcers. Father Kneipp, a great admirer of honey, remarked: "Smaller ulcers in the stomach are quickly contracted, broken and healed by it."

Honey is a rapidly acting source of muscular energy and has great value as a restorative. The protoplasm craves sugar as does an individual. Muscles in action consume three and a half times as much glycogen as when at rest. A normal heart, according to Starling, uses glycogen at the rate of four milligrams per gram of heart per hour. The invigorating effect of honey was discussed under the heading, "Honey for Athletes and Soldiers." It is not surprising that many well-known physicians recommend honey for an ailing heart. Dr. Lorand in Old Age Deferred, and in Life Shortening Habits and Rejuvenation, expresses his faith in honey as a sine qua non in arteriosclerosis and weak heart. Dr. G. N. W. Thomas, of Edinburgh, Scotland, in an article in the Lancet remarks that "in heart weakness I have found honey to have a marked effect in reviving the heart action and keeping patients alive. I had further evidence of this in a recent case of pneumonia. The patient consumed two pounds of honey during the illness; there was an early crisis with no subsequent rise of temperature and an exceptionally good pulse. I suggest that honey should be given for general physical repair and, above all, for heart failure." Sir Arbuthnot Lane also emphasized the value of honey as a heart and muscle stimulant, and as an excellent source of energy. There is no better food, he thought, to meet muscular fatigue and exhaustion.

Carbohydrate and especially sugar metabolism has great importance. Energy is primarily the result of carbohydrate assimilation. Hyperglycemic individuals are, as a rule, more energetic and less prone to fatigue; subglycemic people tire easily and are apathetic. Certain nervous types, though glycophile subjects, exhaust their sugar reserve fast and wear out just as quickly. Lack of energy is not always due to laziness.

In typhoid fever and pneumonia, where the digestive functions are badly crippled, honey is most beneficial. Why embarrass enfeebled digestions with foods which require chemical changes before their assimilation when we can administer a serviceable and pleasant food which is predigested? For the treatment of typhoid fever, honey diluted in water is the author's preferential food. It is an ideal substance, in this special instance, on account of its demulcent effect on the inflamed intestines, its rapid assimilation and its capability to supply food and energy without causing fermentation, which is so much feared in typhoid fever. Honey, a concentrated and predigested food, is absorbed orally I00% and per rectum 96%. For rectal feeding honey is exceptionally well adapted. Galen's honey and oil enema was highly valued in antiquity. While sugar favors worms, honey was considered as one of the best vermifuge remedies by all ancients and it is widely used for this purpose, even today, by primitive races.

Medical textbooks pay only little attention to the real worth and merit of honey. The results which some physicians have de-rived from the use of honey, as a rule, have been incidental. Dr. C. H. English, Medical Director of the Lincoln National Life Insurance Co., vividly describes his own experience (Gleanings in Bee Culture, 55:1927). About forty-one years ago the doctor practiced medicine among rural folk. He acquired two colonies of bees which soon increased and it was not long until he had more honey on hand than he and his family could use. Not wishing to sell honey, it occurred to him to distribute his surplus stock among patients. There were a sufficient number of cases which offered an excellent field to try out the nutrimental, medicinal and tonic effects of honey. In respiratory troubles, the doctor found that honey acted not only as a good expectorant but as a valuable heart tonic. In pneumonia, near the crisis, when honey was freely given, it had a marked effect. The benefits were so evident that the administration of honey became a routine practice with him. He found no other food or heart stimulant which had a more lasting effect. This practice he kept up for fifteen years with the most gratifying results. Occasionally in severe cases, when he ran short of honey, he noticed the difference and when he succeeded again in procuring some the improvement was quite manifest. Dr. English also used honey success-fully in infant feeding.

The blood reconstructive power of honey can be surmised from a recent report from Germany. According to this information Edmund Eckardt (thirty-five years old) a champion blood donor, whose only visible means of support is to supply blood for trans-fusions, just celebrated his jubilee. He has saved fifty lives in the last three years. When interviewed as to how he makes good his losses he described his diet. During daily breakfast he consumes honey; for luncheon he has fish and vegetables and drinks orange juice with his dinner. His main reliance is on honey and oranges, of which he eats thirty a day. An expert of the Blood Transfusion Betterment Association of New York, when inter-viewed on the subject, suggested that Eckhardt's faith in oranges is unjustified because what a blood donor needs is iron, and Eckardt in fact, "does not mention that any part of his diet contains iron." Another occasion where "dethroned" honey was utterly disregarded! Count Luckner, of World War fame, is an extremely moderate eater. He is about sixty-five years old and looks no more than forty. Luckner bends a silver half-dollar with two fingers and tears a Manhattan telephone directory into small pieces with greatest ease. The Count relates that his first food in the morning is a "goodly portion of honey."

Many people, especially beekeepers, and a few physicians (this writer among them) claim that honey taken internally prevents and often cures arthritic and rheumatoid ailments. The peasants of Hungary even put a honey poultice over the big toe in gout and they say the pain disappears in half an hour. Such assertions have, of course, all the earmarks of unscientific broach. Still there are many who insist that honey has benefited them more than all the "scientific" vaccines. Vitamin C deficiency would explain an impaired circulation and recent researches ( James F. Reinhart, Studies relating to Vitamin C deficiency in rheumatic fever and rheumatoid arthritis, Annals of Internal Medicine, December, 1935), clearly prove that lack of vitamin C favors the development of infectious arthritis. Dr. Heermann of Kassel, Germany, suggests (Fortschritte der Medizin, Vol. 54) 1936) the use of honey for rheumatism, atrophy of muscles, nervous conditions, tuberculotic glands, etc., both internally and externally. He employed honey with success for thirty-five years. Dr. Heermann thinks it is unnecessary to extract the venom of the bees to treat these conditions. Honey itself contains some venom because the bees use their stings not only for defense but also for the preservation of honey.

Many beekeepers are of the opinion that, besides the admitted and generally recognized curative effects of the stings in rheumatic ailments, honey also contributes its benefits in preventing and curing these diseases. As an illustration, I quote a letter from J. L. McD., of Marion, Indiana: "I began bee keeping be-cause I had rheumatism, and it has disappeared, but I consider it due more to the fact that I ate honey than to bee stings. Nearly four years ago, I had rheumatism in my knees. I finally went to Dr. K of Marion, Indiana, for advice. He put me on a citrous fruit diet, allowing only honey. In a week, he allowed breakfast food sweetened with honey. It did the work, and I liked honey so well that I bought a few hives of bees to supply my family, and now—nearly four years later—I want everyone to know honey and to like it, as Nature's own health-sweet, full of pep and vitamins that God gave us, pure as snow. My growing son is developing into a healthy, sturdy ten-year old since the use of honey, egg and milk drinks. My rheumatism never returned."

Honey, taken by itself and not mixed with other foods, was considered by the ancients an excellent remedy for obesity. Bee-keepers today, who know it from their own experience, will confirm this allegation. The regimen, at a glance, sounds rather unscientific to a modern physician; nevertheless it has a deeper biochemical meaning than it appears to have. Fats and sugars are both carbon-containing and energy-providing foods which burn up by contact with oxygen and create energy. Sugars which contain more carbon elements and are more inflammable produce energy more quickly. Fats which contain less carbon and oxygen than sugars, are utilized slower because their purpose is only to supply reserve energy; they require more oxygen and more draught to set them afire and are not meant for immediate use. If there is not enough sugar to keep the fires burning, the system will resort to its reserve fat. Accordingly when sugars, especially honey, are ingested into the system they will cause a rapid combustion and the fats will burn with the aid of the draught produced by their "fire." If an organism is slow to burn up fat (as in obesity), it will be assisted by the rapidity of sugar metabolism. The process could be compared to setting slowly inflammable coal ablaze with the aid of straw, kindling wood or even oil. Of course, there is sufficient oxygen in carbohydrates to assist in the combustion of carbon elements even without an outside source of oxygen.

Acknowledging some more medical information received from the laity, the writer's attention has been repeatedly called to the beneficial effect of honey on hay fever victims. There are many reports that the consumption of honey collected by bees from goldenrod and fireweed will cure hay fever superinduced by the selfsame pollen. Now comes Dr. George D. McGrew, of the Army Medical Corps of the William Beaumont General Hospital in El Paso, Texas, with a statement in an article published in the Military Surgeon that during the 1936 hay-fever season thirty-three hay-fever sufferers obtained partial or complete re-lief through the consumption of honey, produced in their vicinity. The brood cells contain a considerable amount of bee-bread (pollen) stored by the bees for their young and when this is orally administered it will produce a gradual immunity against the allergic symptoms caused by the same pollen. Dr. McGrew found particular relief for patients when they chewed the honey with the wax of the brood-cells. The hospital staff also made an alcoholic extract from pollen and administered it in from one to ten drop doses, according to the requirements of the patients.

Old beekeepers will tell you that a glassful of hot water with a tablespoonful of honey and some lemon juice will cure influenza and also help the pocketbook. (We physicians should not begrudge the medical propensity of farmers. They seem to agree with Bernard Shaw's remark that every profession is a conspiracy against the laity, so they retaliate. And the time-honored principle, experience versus theory, upon which Napoleon so often commented, should also be taken into consideration. The Hungarians have liberally consumed paprika for a thousand years and are convinced that it has contributed in a great measure to their health and temperament. After Professor Szent-Györgyi, the discoverer of Vitamin C, had tried unsuccessfully in Chicago to produce this vitamin from tons of liver, he returned very much disappointed to Hungary, where he accidentally found that red pepper is a rich source of Vitamin C.)

Honey would have a wider and better use in modern medicine if comprehensive microchemical and physiological studies would be instituted to determine the types of honey which are best suited to particular cases. The properties and tendencies of honeys vary according to the chemical characteristics of the nectar and pollen of plants from which they were collected. Dr. C. A. Browne, Principal Chemist in charge of research, Bureau of Chemistry and Soils, U. S. Department of Agriculture, admits that the gross composition of honeys of various types have been accurately determined but that comparatively little has been done and much more remains to be done toward ascertaining the nature and quantities of less common substances that occur in honey. Nitrogenous compounds (proteins), though honey contains these in small amounts, still play a very important rôle in the utilization of honey. The same applies to amino acids, various colloidal sub-stances, to the mineral constituents and enzymes which honey contains. We have comparatively little definite knowledge about the so-called dextrins. The mineral content of honey considerably affects the degree of its acidity (pH). Dr. Browne thinks that more knowledge on the subject would be of great value in ear-marking the various types of honey, which would serve as a guide in choosing the most suitable types for particular use.

obmar · Re: The Bee Honey - Gift of God

obmar

Health Benefits of Honey

Honey has long been recognized as a natural remedy and has been used as a medicine for thousands of years. Health benefits of Honey - History of Honey, Mead, Royal Jelly

Perhaps your parents failed to mention it when they discussed the birds and the bees with you, but honey has long been known to have a multitude of healing powers with everything from relieving a sore throat, allergies, healing wounds, etc. It also goes great with peanutbutter. Now, new scientific research from the University of California, Davis reveals that honey consumption raises antioxidant levels.

In the study, 25 people were told to eat between four and 10 tablespoons of buckwheat honey, depending on their weight, each day for a month. They could eat the honey in almost any form, but it couldn't be baked or dissolved in tea. Many chose to eat straight from the spoon. Antioxidant levels rose in the participants. Antioxidants provide defense against free radicals, which cause cell damage.

Researchers discovered honey contained as many antioxidants - which combat the free radicals which can damage cells - as spinach, apples, oranges or strawberries. Scientists from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign say honey appears to have a "mild protective effect".

It was already known that honey contained varying levels of antioxidants, with dark honey having more than light. This is the first study to examine honey's effect on human blood.

In the study, researchers checked the blood of 25 men aged 18 - 68 over five weeks.

They found drinking four tablespoons of honey mixed into a 16-ounce glass of water improved the antioxidant levels in their blood.

The team is currently conducting a study on rabbits to see if honey could slow atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries.

The types of flowers the bees pollinate determine flavor and color of honey. Buckwheat honey comes from the buckwheat plant and is dark in color with a distinct flavor. The darker shades of honey are believed to have more antioxidants. The study showed no weight gain in participants for the month they were consuming honey. And, some claimed that eating honey for breakfast actually made them feel full and satisfied.

Eating honey along with supplemental calcium appeared to enhance calcium absorption in rats, according to a study from Purdue University.

In addition, the researchers suggested that the absorption of calcium increased as the amount of honey taken was upped.

Sugar is a crystalline carbohydrate extracted from sugar cane and sugar beets. It is a non-nutritive empty calorie that robs the body of vitamins and minerals. Sugar is addicting. The biggest culprit? Soft drinks, which account for one-third of our total sugar intake.

Approximately one half of the human diet is derived directly or indirectly from crops pollinated by bees. Today honeybees are an essential part of a healthy agriculture economy. If you have allergies, honey can be beneficial. If you eat honey that is local to your area, it may prevent your seasonal allergies. Bees use the pollen from local plants and eventually it ends up in your honey.

Health-promoting compounds found in honey could make this ingredient a more attractive option for food makers currently using bulk sweeteners such as high-fructose corn syrup and looking to jump on board the growing health foods trend, say scientists in the US.

Researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign say that honey may be a healthier alternative to corn syrup due to its higher level of antioxidants, compounds which are believed to fight cancer, heart disease and other diseases. Honey, which contains a number of antioxidant components that act as preservatives, also shows promise as a replacement for some synthetic antioxidants widely used as preservatives in salad dressings and other foods.

High fructose syrups kicked off in the US in the 1970s when the country developed new technologies to process this bulk calorific sweetener. The ingredient, an alternative to sucrose, rapidly gained in popularity and is now used extensively by soft drinks makers such as Coca-Cola and PepsiCo.

Honey, a natural syrup produced by bees is similar to invert sugar, with a small but variable excess of levulose (fructose). The composition and flavor of honey varies with the plant source of the nectar, processing and storage but a typical composition is 41 per cent fructose, 34 per cent glucose, 18 per cent water, and 2 per cent sucrose with a pH of 3.8 to 4.2.

According to the US researchers, dark-colored honey, such as buckwheat honey, is generally thought to contain higher levels of antioxidants than the light-colored varieties. Previous studies by the researchers, who presented their findings this week at the American Chemical Society meeting in Illinois, suggest that honey may have the same level of disease-fighting antioxidants as that of some common fruits.

In international terms China is currently by far the largest honey producing nation in the world, with around a 40 per cent slice of the market. The next biggest producers are the US, Argentina and Ukraine. According to the American Honey Producers Association, China and Argentina have been adversely affecting America’s domestic honey industry with cheap imports, although there is a counter argument that both China and Argentina have been helping to counterbalance falling production in the US. Also starting to emerge onto the world honey production arena are Thailand and Vietnam.

Honey contains vitamins, minerals, and amino acids, and is a wonderful beauty aid that nourishes the skin and the hair. Honey acts as an antibacterial and antifungal agent and helps disinfect and speed the healing process in wounds, scrapes and burns.

* Honey mixed with ground almonds makes an excellent facial cleansing scrub.

* A tablespoon of honey whisked together with an egg white, 1 teaspoon of glycerin and about 1/4 cup of flour makes an excellent firming mask. Just smooth on the face, leave on 15 minutes, and rinse off with warm water. You will be pleased with the results.

* Honey also makes a great moisturizing pack. Just mix 2 tablespoons of honey with 2 teaspoons of whole milk, smooth over the face and throat, and let it do its job for 15 minutes. Rinse off with warm water, and finish splashing with cold water.

* Honey also makes a great lotion for dry patches of skin on hands, elbows, or other parts. Just mix 1 teaspoon of honey with 1 teaspoon of olive oil and a 1/2 teaspoon of lemon juice. Apply to hands, elbows, heels of your foot, etc., and wash off after 15 minutes. Fast relief!

* Honey works well on chapped lips and for acne because it has antibacterial properties.

* To give your hair lustrous shine, mix 1 teaspoon of honey into 4 cups of warm water. Use as a hair rinse. And if you're a blond, add the juice of 1 lemon, too.

* Mix 1 tablespoon of honey with a cup of warm water. Use it as a mouthwash. Honey cleans teeth and dentures, and kills germs in the mouth.

Royal Jelly: Royal jelly is a substance produced by worker bees inside the beehive. Inside this nutritious substance are sugar, proteins, fats and many vitamins. It is used in problems caused by tissue deficiency or body frailty.

Even ancient languages give us a clue to the importance of honey. The BEE (bhei-) was particularly important as the producer of honey, for which we have the common Indo-European name melit-. Honey was the only source of sugar and sweetness (swd-, “sweet,” is ancient), and notably was the base of the only certain Indo-European alcoholic beverage, medhu-, which in different dialects meant both MEAD (“wine” in Greece and Anatolia) and “honey.”

A Land of Milk and Honey

And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey: unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites. -- Exodus 3: 8

Addressing Moses from the burning bush, Yahweh announces his plan to bring Israel out of Egypt to a "land flowing with milk and honey." God means Palestine, the land he promised to Abraham (Genesis 12) and again to Jacob (Genesis 2 Cool

.

He doesn't mean, though, that milk and honey wash over the land -- as "flowing" might suggest -- but rather that his people can look forward to a booming economy. (They could also look forward to unfriendly natives, but that's another story.) Milk and honey were dietary staples for the semi-nomadic Israelites of biblical times, so Palestine would indeed be a promising home, abounding in goats and swarming with bees. The soil would be fertile also.

Mead (honey wine) has for centuries been renowned as an 'aphrodisiac' and the word Honeymoon is derived from the ancient Viking custom of having newly-weds drink mead for a whole moon (month) in order to increase their fertility and therefore their chances of a happy and fulfilled marriage. We have returned full cycle to the birds and the bees.

The Inquisitor

Unfortunately, obmar

Are mobile phones wiping out our bees?

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk...local-national/article2452949.ece

obmar

here is some more about the amazing bees

FEMALE HONEYBEE, BUILDER OF HER OWN CELL
68- And your Lord revealed the female honeybee; build homes in mountains, and trees, and in the hives people built for you.
16-The Honeybee, 68

In narrating the doings of the honeybee, the Quran uses the feminine gender. In Arabic, verbs are conjugated according to gender. The use in the Quran of the feminine gender in conjugation shows that the acts were performed by the female bee. To translate the honeybee in question with the addition of the adjective “female” before the honeybee would be natural. (It should be noted however that the orthography of both the feminine and the masculine is the same for honeybee.) The working of the female honeybee is described in the Quran as follows:

1- Building of hive (verse 6 Cool

2- Collecting of nectar, new material for honey production (verse 69)
3- Making honey (verse 69)

All the above three functions are performed by female bees. The unique function of the male, more robust with big eyes, is to fertilize the young queen female bee. The male bees that fulfill this function are expelled from the hive by their females at the end of the summer and, as they are used to being looked after by their females, they then die of starvation.

At the time of the descent of the Quran, men did not know the details of the distribution of work among the bees living in a hive; they did not know that those actively working in the hive were females. They did not know that the function of producing honey and collecting nectar from fruits belonged to female bees. Therefore, it is interesting, indeed, that in listing the duties of bees, the Quran used the mode of conjugation in the Arabic intended for the female gender.

MATHEMATICIAN BEES
The functions performed by the female honeybee leave us in wonder. The design of the cells in which she will live call for the erudition of a mathematician. Honeybees produce their honeycombs in the form of hexagons. (Bee fossils show that this was also the case millions of years ago.) Mathematicians inquiring into the reason why this hexagon remained constant and why there were no rectangles, heptagons, octagons, etc. found out that the optimum use of the entire space of unit could be no other than a hexagon, which also accounted for the production of cells using the available material in the most economical fashion. Had the cells been of a different shape, i.e., triangular or quadrilateral, there would be no vacuum, as well. But less material is required to build hexagonal cells than that required for triangular or quadrilateral cells. In many other shapes there would be unutilized space left. Thus the hexagonal cell is capable of storing the greater amount of honey with less wax.

This structure is the result of the combined work of thousands of bees, each contributing to the entire geometrical opus. Mathematicians have proven that no larger space could be arranged with a given amount of wax to fit the geometrical design. The worker bees show how they can realize it in the most economical fashion with what they have.

A French entomologist by the name of Antoine Ferchault posited a geometrical problem referred to as the “Bee Problem.” He stated that “a cell of regular hexagonal cross section is closed by three equal and equally inclined rhombuses. Calculate the smaller angle of the rhombus when the total surface area of the cell is least possible.” Three leading mathematicians, a German, a Swiss and a Brit, tried to solve this problem, and all of them found the following result: 70 degrees 32 minutes. This exactly fits the angle of cells constructed by the female bees. Even the wisest of men could not suggest an improvement on the female bees’ technique of building.

The worker bees’ points of departure in the production process of these cells differ. As the work proceeds, the cells converge toward a central point. The angles of cells at the point where they meet are perfect. It is clear that the construction of this design, the distances between the beginning and the end points and the precise calculation of the positions of their fellow workers display unbelievable exactitude.

The most renowned mathematicians demonstrated the bees’ unerring calculation measured as 70 degrees 32 minutes. However, were we to suggest that these men of science take a ruler in hand and make a hexagon with perfectly fitting angles, and then add to the instructions given to these three professors, asking that the calculation used to form the hexagons be regular and flawless, they would fail in the task. We see that the bees are not only great theoreticians but also skillful practitioners. In the theoretical field, this calculation is incredibly exact, while their dexterity in applying it is unbelievable accurate.

How do these bees, whose lifetime is very short, achieve all these calculations and construction work? To call this ingenuity mere “instinct” does not explain anything. The Quran states that the bee received revelations according to which God’s design and programming were put into execution. Within the span of the honeybee’s lifetime, the cleverest of men could not learn even to count, let alone be the author of such a perfect design. We cannot account for the erudition of bees, certainly not as pure luck. The Creator who created the bee made her with all her potentialities, having solved for her all these mathematical problems. The same Creator sees to it that the bee works for ends that also serve mankind in general. In the second part of this book MMLC 15 where the mathematical miracles will be dealt with, we will examine the mathematical code of the suras and verses where “honeybee” is mentioned. God, who endowed the bee with mathematical characteristics, presented further mathematical miracles in the suras and verses in which “honeybee” is mentioned.

The Inquisitor

obmar,

Do you believe that the bee is in danger of extinction??

obmar

The Inquisitor

Well,

There are other insects who pollinate, so it's not like we have nothing to replace the bee with. But my concern is on the phenomenon of the bee heading towards extinction.

I think if this were indeed true, there would be much more said on the subject. If there are already 50% less bees around the world, why aren't we seeing a major loss in harvests around the world??

I just don't know how true and how serious it is.

obmar

When I was a child still, there was a massive land conversion from natural forest in palm oil plantation. That displaced a lot of large bee colonies and every afternoon for yoite a while I saw dark moving clouds
of migrating bees. Sometimes they fly low and we would hide indoor.

THat was when FELDA JENGKA was established, in late sixties.

The Inquisitor

What's Felda Jengka?

obmar · What is Felda Jengka

http://www.apsa2005.net/FullPapers/PdfFormat/Full%20Paper%20(I-N)/Nurwati%20Badarulzaman.pdf

It was a land development government intiated project as part of the socio economic engineering intiatives conducted in pahang in the late 60's and early 70's

The Bee Honey - Gift of God

Honey In Modern Therapeutics

Re: The Bee Honey - Gift of God

What is Felda Jengka