Is It Possible For Other Insects To Produce Honey?

Honey is a natural product of various insects, including stingless bees (Meliponini), which are about 500 bee species that are excellent honey producers and efficient crop pollinators. Honeybees and stingless bees are the only known species to produce honey on a commercially viable scale. Honeypot ants eat mites and other insects, scavenging and feeding on dead insects or animals. Some insects, like aphids, eat plant sap and leave behind trails of sugary liquid called honeydew. Honey can be stored without risk of spoilage by social insects that produce it from the nectar or honeydew they collect from living plants.

Insects like all Apis spp. are known to feed on nectar and produce honey. Honey bees are the only eusocial insects to produce honey, and all non-parasitic bumblebees and stingless bees produce honey. Most bees are solitary bees and do not produce honey. Honey is the primary food for adults and pollen for larvae.

Other insect species, such as ants and wasps, also produce and store honey. Adult wasps feed on other insects like spiders, caterpillars, and aphids but also consume nectar and honeydew. In addition to Apis bees, many other bees, particularly stingless bees in the Meliponini tribe, also produce and store honey. However, defining honey as something made by honey bees is a circular argument at best.

Which Insects Are Not Related To The Bee Family?

The honey pot bee is an insect unrelated to the bee family that produces honey and a syrupy substance called honeydew. Bees, closely related to wasps and ants, are primarily known for pollination and honey production, particularly the western honey bee. While bees and wasps both belong to the order Hymenoptera, they are classified into different families: bees in Apidae and wasps in Vespidae. Other honey-producing species include bumble bees and carpenter bees, but they yield minimal amounts compared to honey bees, leading to their obscurity.

Most bees are solitary, with only honey bees, bumble bees, and some mining bees forming true social colonies. Leaf-cutter bees, identifiable by semi-circular leaf holes on rose bushes, illustrate this. Both bees and ants are prevalent social insects, characterized by a hierarchical structure and a queen that reproduces. Bees are believed to have evolved from wasps, exhibiting numerous similarities; they are part of the same order, Hymenoptera, which includes ants and sawflies.

The Apoidea superfamily includes all bees and sphecoid wasps, highlighting the close relationship between these insects. Many bee look-alikes, particularly hoverflies, resemble bees but are harmless and lack stingers. Although similar in appearance, the genetic makeup of termites and naked mole rats differs from species like ants, bees, and wasps. Identification of the diverse Hymenoptera family can be challenging due to the small size of many species.

What Insects Make Honey?

Apis mellifera, commonly known as the western honey bee, is globally recognized as "the honey bee." However, it is not the sole producer of honey; various other bee, ant, and wasp species also create and store this sweet, viscous substance. Indigenous cultures worldwide have utilized these insects as a natural source of sugar for centuries. Honey is primarily produced by bees collecting and refining sugary secretions from plants, especially floral nectar and honeydew secreted by aphids and other insects. Aphids excrete honeydew, a sugary liquid resulting from their feeding on plant sap, as they extract vital nutrients from the phloem of plants.

Honey bees are prolific, capable of producing hundreds of pounds of honey annually. Yet, insects such as ants, wasps, and even termites have their unique methods of creating honey-like substances. The article aims to explore this broader spectrum of honey-making insects, emphasizing that honey production is not confined to honey bees alone. Other non-parasitic eusocial insects such as bumblebees and stingless bees also produce honey. Additionally, honey wasps and honey ants contribute to the honey niche in their own ways.

Notably, sweat bees, orchid bees, digger bees, leafcutter bees, and cuckoo bees are among other bee species that produce honey-like substances. Honey, defined by its sweet composition, can be stored without spoiling, thanks to these social insects' remarkable capabilities in collecting nectar and honeydew from plants, demonstrating the diversity within the insect world regarding honey production.

Are Bees The Only Insects That Produce Honey?

Surprisingly, bees are not the only insects that produce the highly sought-after honey. While approximately seven species of Apis honey bees are globally recognized as the quintessential "honey bees," native to regions in Asia, Africa, and Europe, many other insects also create honey. Among these, certain paper wasps, notably the Mexican honey wasps (Brachygastra spp.), store excess nectar in their cardboard nests.

Additionally, stingless bees, totaling around 500 species within the Meliponini genus, produce honey and are prevalent in warm regions. These stingless bees are often utilized by farmers for their efficient pollination of crops.

Honey production is not exclusive to honey bees. Other eusocial insects, including non-parasitic bumblebees and various stingless bees, also generate honey. Some wasp species, such as Brachygastra lecheguana and Brachygastra mellifica found in South and Central America, feed on nectar and produce honey. In total, up to 800 bee species create some form of honey, although most varieties are not suitable for human consumption.

Remarkably, bees are unique among millions of insect species in producing a substance—honey—that humans can safely consume without adverse effects. Historically, honey has been valued not only as a sweetener but also for its medicinal properties.

Honey bees live in highly organized colonies where worker bees defend the hive by stinging intruders and releasing pheromones to trigger collective defense responses. The distinct species of honey bees are identifiable by the small barbs on their stingers, present only in workers. The process of making honey involves bees collecting nectar from flowers and honeydew from other insects, mixing it with enzymes from their mouths, and storing the mixture in hexagonal wax cells within their nests. This enzymatic transformation is crucial for honey's preservation, allowing it to be stored indefinitely without spoiling.

Despite the prominence of Apis honey bees, the vast diversity of bee species—estimated at around 25, 000 worldwide—means that honey production is a widespread phenomenon among various bee and wasp species. While honey bees dominate in recognition and commercial production, ongoing discoveries by scientists and enthusiasts continue to reveal the extensive range of honey-producing insects, highlighting the rich biodiversity and complex behaviors underlying honey creation across different ecosystems.

Do Ants Make Honey?

Scientists have confirmed what Indigenous Australians have known for millennia about honeypot ants: they store a unique type of honey made from nectar. While ants do not produce honey like bees, certain species known as honeypot ants have specialized workers called repletes. These repletes can swell their abdomens significantly by gorging on nectar, acting as "living pantries" to store honey. When food is scarce, they regurgitate the honey for the colony's consumption.

Unlike bee honey, ant honey is less dense, less sweet, and has a sour taste due to its different composition. Ants primarily collect simple sugar fluids and do not convert nectar into honey like bees do; instead, they often collect honeydew, a sugary fluid secreted by sap-sucking insects. Research published in PeerJ indicates that honeypot ant honey possesses strong antimicrobial properties, capable of combating certain pathogens, which aligns with Indigenous knowledge of its use for treating ailments such as sore throats and wounds.

The social structure of honeypot ants is similar to that of bees and wasps, with a focus on foraging for nectar from flowers, but their method of storing nectar is uniquely adapted. Although ants like honeypot ants do enjoy honey, the intricacies of how they manage and utilize their stored nectar set them apart from bees. Overall, this research not only highlights the ecological importance of honeypot ants but also acknowledges the valuable insights gained from Indigenous practices and knowledge over thousands of years.