When I was little, I remember lying on the living room couch with a sore throat and an upset tummy, miserable as only sick children can be. My grandmother was playing cards with a few of her friends, and I couldn’t have felt less festive. One of her friends, Aunt Rita, made me honey toast. I didn’t even want it, but I ate some, and I was instantly healed.
No one pointed at me as if it was a miracle, but that was okay- I was pretty shy, so I just sat up, got dressed properly, and went to play. Even having experienced this, and having read that honey was used in World War 1 as a wound healer in the battlefield, because of its antibiotic qualities, and other good things that bees put in honey, I don’t eat it all that often. But I do collect honey cookbooks or pamphlets I come across, and I like to buy local honey from any place I visit, as a souvenir!
That’s about all I know about bees or beekeeping, but a few months ago, when I investigated the whitenose syndrome that has been killing off bats, I read in several sources that scientists suspect it’s related to the devastating die off of bees, which syndrome is called, “colony collapse disorder.”
