HOW IS A HONEYCOMB ABLE TO SUPPORT THE WEIGHT OF HONEY WITHOUT TEARING?

A bee honeycomb has an hexagonal shape, which allows its thin wax membranes to hold honey up to 30 times its weight.

Bees on honeycombs

The walls of six-sided honeycomb cells are very thin measuring 1/3 of mm (approximately 1/80 of an inch).

Hexagonal shape of bee honeycomb cells

The honeycomb cells have a hexagonal shape, which allows the thin membranes made of wax to hold honey up to 30 times the weight of the honeycomb. The walls of six-sided cells are fragile—1/3 of mm (approximately 1/80 of an inch), but when linked together, the pattern makes the honeycomb much stronger than it would have been if structured in any other shape.

It is estimated that bees visit 2,000 flowers to make 0.45kg (one pound) of honey.

Bee honeycombs on wood

A work bee produces 1/12 of a teaspoonful of honey in its lifetime.

Honeycomb full of honey

The structure beautiful and at the same time enables bees to use beeswax economically since it is expensive to produce. A work bee produces 1/12 of a teaspoonful of honey in its lifetime, and bees visit approximately 2,000 flowers to make 0.45kg (one pound) of honey. A honeybee, according to the book By Nature’s Design: An Exploratorium Book (Exploratorium Book Series) by Pat Murphy, needs 16g (1/2 ounce) of honey to make 1g (1/32 ounce) of beeswax.