Recently I noticed that a large art supplier was buying Dutch Gold honey and I wondered why an art supply company would be buying honey. It sounded a little curious so I looked into it and found out that honey is actually used to make watercolors! The binding agents in watercolor typically include glycerin and gum arabic, but both of these tend to dry out quickly. A humectant is needed in the mixture to retain moisture. Typically, the humectant in most watercolors is corn syrup because it is cheap, but some companies continue to use the original ingredient, honey, in their paints. Honey has been used since the 19th century in watercolors and it is better at retaining moisture than corn syrup. Honey keeps watercolor from hardening, gives an artist great washes and stays moist for longer, allowing an artist more time to manipulate the paint!

If you don't know, honey smuggling is a large operation. Since 2001, Chinese honey that enters the U.S. has anti-dumping duties on it because Chinese honey was being sold at such low prices that it was harmful to the U.S. beekeeping industry. Also, some Chinese honey has been found to have illegal antibiotics in it and is many times mixed with corn syrup to make a larger profit. After the anti-dumping duties took affect, honey started to be transshipped to other countries so that it would avoid these duties. Since then, Homeland Security and the DOJ have fined and arrested people that have been smuggling Chinese honey into the U.S. illegally. Just recently the proposed preliminary renewed anti-dumping duties against Chinese honey have been set at $1.19/lb. This is good news for American beekeepers: hopefully it will deter corrupt honey companies from smuggling in Chinese honey. Purchase honey with the True Source Certified logo on it to make sure that your honey is not from China.

Would you like to get stung by bees on purpose? Apitherapy is treatment via controlled bee stings and the use of beehive products! Bees create quite a number of unique substances that no other creature can create. Propolis, bee venom, royal jelly, bee pollen and beeswax are the most noted of these. It is becoming more and more popular by the day as people turn away from Western medicine to treat their ailments. Many people swear by apitherapy to help alleviate certain types of pain including swelling and joint pain. Many people that suffer from arthritis have turned to bees to help. To learn more on apitherapy, a good website is www.apitherapy.org.

Why do bees make honey? So they have something to sustain themselves during winter of course! But since many commercial beekeepers need to sell the honey for profit, honey gets taken out of the hive and beekeepers must replace it with another food for the bees to survive on. Sometimes honey is replaced with High Fructose Corn Syrup. Research has shown that a bee's life is shortened about 4-5 days when fed a diet of HFCS. Not good! Even though HFCS may seem like a safe alternative, the original source --Corn-- is almost all genetically modified and treated with pesticides these days. It would be hard not believe that some trace of these pesticides helps to cause this. Sugar water seems to be a safer bet if you need to feed bees.