We all know that bees make honey, that sweet, thick liquid gold prized by tea-drinkers, bears, and honey badgers alike, but not all bees make honey.

我們都知道蜜蜂製作蜂蜜，那甜蜜、濃厚金黃液體，深受嗜茶者、熊，以及蜜獾喜愛，但並不是所有蜜蜂都會製作蜂蜜。

Insects like bumble bees, sting-less bees, and even honey wasps can produce small amounts of honey, but the stuff you're familiar with is the product of one of the seven species of true honey bees.

像是雄蜂、無針蜂族，甚至黃蜂也只會生產少量蜂蜜，你我熟悉的蜂蜜是七種真蜜蜂中其中一種所生產。

Simply put, bees make honey as a source of food security, sometimes to eat during times of scarcity, safely stored within the hive, and the responsibility for making this stockpile falls to the female worker, or forager bees.

簡而言之，蜜蜂將蜂蜜視為食安來源，有時遇到食物短缺，他們會將蜂蜜妥當地儲存在蜂房內，這些則是由雌蜂或覓食蜂負責。

They're the ones that buzz from flower to flower, sucking up sugary nectar with their long, tubular tongues, and they're also the ones who build and defend the hive and take care of the queen.

他們就是在花朵間振翅響聲的蜜蜂們，他們會伸出管狀的舌頭吸吮花蜜，也是負責建蜂巢來保護女王蜂的蜜蜂。

These hard-working ladies do it all while the queen sits back and lays ridiculous amounts of eggs, like, seriously, some scientists estimate that a single queen can lay up to a quarter-million eggs in a single year and more than a million over her lifetime.

這女蜂很勤勉的工作，女王蜂則是休息以及產出驚人數量的蛋，說真的，科學計算每隻女王蜂會在一年間產出二十萬個蛋，她們一輩子會產出超過一百萬個蛋。

Male drone bees meanwhile basically only exist to mate with the queen and then die, I digress.

基本上雄蜂就是跟女王交配然後就死了，我離題了。

So, a worker bee collects nectar and stores it in her crop, which is sort of like an extra holding tank, also called the honey stomach, designed just for this purpose.

工蜂收集花蜜後會把蜜囤在體內，像是倉庫般的設計，稱為蜂蜜肚。

Once she's back home, she basically pukes her loot up into another processor bee's mouth, who then spits the nectar into a honeycomb cell.

工蜂回家，就會將收穫的花蜜吐給理器的蜜蜂，理器蜜蜂會將這些花蜜再吐進蜂巢裡。

Every time that processor bee regurgitates nectar into a storage cell, she adds a special enzyme called invertase.

理器蜜蜂將花蜜重新注入蜂巢時，會隨之在內添加一種叫做轉化酶的特殊酶。

The nectar is pretty much just sugar water, and therefore perishable, but the invertase helps break that sucrose down into simpler sugar molecules, glucose and fructose, eventually transforming it into something that will hold up in long-term storage.

花蜜非常像一般糖水，容易腐爛，轉化酶有助於將蔗糖分解成更簡單的糖分子、葡萄糖和果糖，最後能把轉化成能長久保存的物體。

At this point, the newly regurgitated nectar is still quite runny; it's got a water content of around 70%, while honey has a water content of less than 19%.

此時，剛從工蜂體內噴出的花蜜還是流動的質地，裡頭的水份大概含有 70% ，而蜂蜜的含水量需低於 19%。

So to remove the extra water those ingenious little bees actually start fanning the honeycomb with their wings to get the evaporation process cranking.

為了移除多餘的水份，聰明的蜜蜂會對著蜂巢振翅，以起到蒸發的效果。

Once the extra water has been fanned away and the nectar has ripened into honey, the lady-bees seal up those comb cells using a beeswax secretion from their abdomens.

當多餘的水份蒸發後，花蜜會變成蜂蜜，這時女蜂會從體內分泌出蜂蠟來密封蜂巢。

When safely sealed away within the comb, honey can basically last forever.

蜂巢被完整密封後，蜂蜜基本上就能永久保存。

Pretty sweet.

非常甜。

Thanks for asking, internet.

感謝網上提問。

And thanks especially to our Subbable subscribers who keep these answers coming.

特別感謝 Subbable 的追蹤者找出這些解答。

They also get these episodes a little bit early as a special thank you.

他們讓這些影片更早做出來，特別感謝。

If you have a quick question for us, you can let us know on Facebook or Twitter, or down in the comments below and don't forget to go to YouTube.com/SciShow and subscribe.

如果你有簡單的問題想問我們，可以透過臉書、推特或直接在底下留言讓我們知道，別忘了到 YouTube.com/SciShow 並訂閱我們。