How Worker Bees Make Honey - Animals 1

Who makes honey?

Honeybees do, of course!

But making honey is a special job for worker honeybees.

How do these bees make honey?

They do it together!

Older worker bees leave the hive early in the morning.

Their job is to gather nectar from flowers.

They suck the nectar with their long, straw-like tongues.

Then they store it in their honey stomachs.

Honeybees have two stomachs.

The normal stomach digests food.

But the honey stomach is just for storing nectar.

This special stomach can hold a lot of nectar!

Filling a honey stomach isn't an easy job.

Bees must visit hundreds of flowers.

That's a lot of flying!

After the bees fill their honey stomachs, they return to the hive.

There, they pass the nectar to other worker bees.

The new workers put the nectar inside the honeycomb.

Honeycomb is a group of small cells inside the hive.

Then worker bees fan the nectar with their wings.

This dries it. Slowly, it grows thick.

The thick, sweet liquid is now honey!

The honey is an important food for the bees.

They store extra honey in the honeycomb.

They will eat it in the winter.

Making honey is hard work.

The worker bees do it together—like a team.