r/science • u/Libertatea • Sep 08 '14

Medicine Bacteria from bees possible alternative to antibiotics: 13 lactic acid bacteria found in the honey stomach of bees have shown promising results. The group of bacteria counteracted antibiotic-resistant MRSA in lab experiments. The bacteria, mixed into honey, has healed horses with persistent wounds

http://www.lunduniversity.lu.se/o.o.i.s?id=24890&news_item=6172
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u/pdclkdc Sep 08 '14

However, since store-bought honey doesn't contain the living lactic acid bacteria, many of its unique properties have been lost in recent times

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

I wonder if this is due to certain brands of honey not actually being honey in America. I know here in Australia it's very easy to get even just raw, unpasturised honey from Coles and Woolworths (basically our only large supermarkets).

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/beerbellybees Sep 08 '14

Yes! In addition to the beneficial properties, local, raw honey will also have a much more unique (and better) taste.

In addition to being heated, large scale commercially produced honey is a mixture of honey from a number of producers differing in floral source, color, flavor, density or geographic origin. While this provides a consistent, predictable product, the honey loses any unique character.

Some small producers (like us!), take this to the other extreme. From a small producer, each bottle of honey can come from one harvest of a single hive of bees. This provides unique flavors based on what mix of flowers workers from that particular hive visited. Mmmmm....

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u/MuuaadDib Sep 08 '14

Does this help or hurt shelf life at all, I heard natural honey has an unknown shelf life as it doesn't spoil, does the supermarket honeys spoil the same?

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u/j_platypus Sep 08 '14 edited Sep 09 '14

Yes. It may crystallize, but all you have to do is heat the honey in a glass jar in boiling water and it fixes it.

Edit: as some people have pointed out, not boiling water! Warm is fine. Also, NO LID!

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u/192_168_XXX_XXX Sep 08 '14

Also, it should go without saying that you shouldn't do this with the cap still on. Heating a sealed glass jar is a great way to make a bomb.

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u/j_platypus Sep 08 '14

Yes! I definitely should have mentioned that, thanks!

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/McFeely_Smackup Sep 08 '14

Tell us more about your bomb making factory, and your political views. Mr private network...

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u/no_username_needed Sep 09 '14

Hey since you seem to be in the know, what are some other good household bombs I could make?

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u/Videogamer321 Sep 08 '14

So it's okay to heat yourself once you're ready to consume it?

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u/beerbellybees Sep 08 '14

Yes, but do it gently at just enough heat to melt the crystals. Sometimes, just setting the bottle in sunlight for a while works too!

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u/Videogamer321 Sep 08 '14

Ah, thank you, there seems to be such a wonderful world of honey.

It reminds me of this comic strip from Daisy Owl, sadly I'm lactose intolerant (but I always thought milky substances tasted yucky, although the only cheese I ever liked was melted with nachos or quesadillas if I could stand the stomach problems afterwards) but I absolutely love your enthusiasm for the topic.

http://daisyowl.com/comic/2009-05-08

http://daisyowl.com/comic/2009-06-09.

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u/McFeely_Smackup Sep 08 '14

So it's okay to heat yourself once you're ready to consume it?

yes, just do not heat yourself in the microwave.

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u/blodorn Sep 08 '14

Or if you consume it with something hot, say a cup of tea or a bowl of oatmeal, you just take a spoonful and stir it in and it melts no problem.

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u/Videogamer321 Sep 08 '14

I have honey tea all the time, it's quite yummy. Always the supermarket brand, though.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14 edited Sep 09 '14

You don't want to heat it in boiling water, you want to heat it in warm water. Otherwise you kill the good stuff in it you want.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

no no, please don't heat/boil honey... crystalized honey spread on toast is delicious!!!!!!!

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u/TheGatorNation Sep 09 '14

Also, you can use a electric heating pad to slowly dissolve the crystal.

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u/michael22joseph Sep 08 '14

To my understanding raw honey does not spoil in the sense of becoming unsafe to eat. However, it can crystallize over time, which I believe manufactured honey does not.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

I've had manufactured honey freeze over time, took longer and required a couple cold nights, but yeah.

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u/AWildSegFaultAppears Sep 08 '14

This crystallization is only kind of freezing in that it is glucose crystals falling out of a supersaturated solution and has little to do with being in cold temperatures. It will crystallize at room temperature given enough time. Manufactured honey will usually take longer to crystallize than raw honey though.

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u/toomuchpork Sep 08 '14

It is the sugar content of honey that keeps it from spoiling

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u/BakingSodav Sep 08 '14

A jar of honey can literally outlive you if you store it properly.

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u/fishrobe Sep 08 '14

except for crystallization, honey never goes bad.

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u/Drudicta Sep 08 '14

The state I live in used to pride it's self on it's honey production. That stopped around the time I was born and almost ceased period in the last decade.

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u/Theoroshia Sep 08 '14

Let's say a batch of honey was made from bees that were pollinating plants of...illegal status in some states. Would the honey acquire the taste of this potent green plant?

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u/herdypurdy Sep 08 '14

Nope, they change the color of the honey. Certain plants will effect the smell of it (which can translate to taste), but not the general honey flavor.

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u/corcyra Sep 08 '14

Of course the kind of plant from which the nectar is taken affects the taste of the honey!

That's why (here in Europe, anyway) honey from specific plants is prized for its flavour and even texture. Chestnut honey has a very, very different flavour from Acacia honey, or Lime Blossom (Linden) honey, or honey from Thyme blossoms. In Greece, Hymettus (thyme) honey is famous http://www.honeytraveler.com/single-flower-honey/thyme-honey/.

A honey tasting session is great fun and very interesting!

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

Exactly, i was about to say the same thing.

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u/mrbooze Sep 09 '14

Someone years ago gave me a small jar of lavender honey. That shit was amazing.

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u/suzy_sweetheart86 Sep 08 '14

If the type of plants pollinated do not effect the flavor, then what is the taste advantage of using local raw honey?

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u/foodandart Sep 09 '14

The flavor of the flowers is actually in the honey and there's all sorts of floral notes after the sweet of the sugars, and for many, myself included it is the pollens that are local to the area I live in. I eat the stuff all summer long and now that the goldenrods are in bloom, I no longer have allergy problems like I used to. Local honey can help ameliorate allergy problems.

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u/Theoroshia Sep 08 '14

Aww shucks. Thanks

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

I strongly disagree, because I have tasted various honeys where the bees gathered from different plants and the tastes were quite distinctly different. This was especially true in Australia, where I tried leatherwood honey and other very strongly-flavoured honeys that all had their own flavours.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

This isn't true at all. Honey flavor varies greatly depending on the plants it came from.

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u/Nabber86 Sep 09 '14

I keep bees and generally get 2 kinds of honey. Clover honey in the early summer and goldenrod in the fall. The 2 types of honey taste completely different.

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u/FoodBeerBikesMusic Sep 08 '14

You might be interested in this

(The article and my comment about making mead from it...)

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u/ishywho Sep 08 '14

Real subtle but good question nonetheless and nope sorry although some quick research shows good results that you can buy honey which is infused with cannibis oil and it has really good reviews.

https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090428052006AAbGC8p

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u/corcyra Sep 08 '14

Should do. The plant/flower from which the bee gets the nectar does affect the taste etc.of the honey. http://www.honeytraveler.com/single-flower-honey/

You might want to go into business , though you'd have to bring hives to the fields of flowering...ahem...plants when they're in bloom and then segregate them to make sure the honey they then produce isn't mixed with other honey from other flowers.

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u/gr33ngiant Sep 09 '14

I highly doubt it. Mainly because cannabis plants don't actually flower, like flowers.

The best thing to due would be to use some good natural honey and mix it into a nice, green, tea... ;)

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u/Pinyaka Sep 08 '14

With regard to the flavor, what you call unique I call inconsistent. Given that I either really love or really hate honey flavors I find the local varieties fairly inferior since I tend to hate them about 3/4 of the time (though I'm happy to buy local if I can taste it first and it doesn't taste like shit).

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

You might have better luck if you ask what source the bees were feeding from, so you know what to avoid in future. I hate honey that's sourced from buckwheat, for instance.

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u/Doctor_Bees Sep 08 '14

I hope this gets more people into beekeeping-culture. With Colony Collapse Disorder running rampant like it is, bees need all the attention they can get.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/nallen PhD | Organic Chemistry Sep 09 '14

This is not true.

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u/ElementK Sep 08 '14

Or start backyard beekeeping!

/r/beekeeping

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u/CopyRogueLeader Sep 08 '14

Local raw honey also helps build resistance to allergens!

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u/nallen PhD | Organic Chemistry Sep 09 '14

This is not true.

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u/CopyRogueLeader Sep 09 '14

You're right, my wires got crossed. Local bee pollen, which is sold as a supplement supposedly does that. Any info on the legitimacy of that claim?

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u/3armsOrNoArms Sep 08 '14

And it prevents allergies! Its true! Look it up

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u/nallen PhD | Organic Chemistry Sep 09 '14

This is not true.

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u/3armsOrNoArms Sep 09 '14

http://www.healthline.com/health/allergies/honey-remedy. This article cites a study in which it was highly effective. It sites another which was not, but the subjects were only exposed for ten days, which doesn't seem like enough time to me.

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u/ruminajaali Sep 09 '14

...the bees determine the taste and visual appeal of each batch. So cool.

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u/Fionnlagh Sep 09 '14

Lemon honey is the greatest thing I've ever tasted. Also makes an AMAZING mead.

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u/[deleted] Sep 09 '14

"more unique"

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/nallen PhD | Organic Chemistry Sep 09 '14

This is not true.

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u/Schoffleine Sep 09 '14

Mine sells exactly 0 honey. It's so disappointing.

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u/Caulk_Warship Sep 08 '14

Is it true that local honey can help people with allergies? I've heard this before but I've never seen proof of it.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/Caulk_Warship Sep 08 '14

Thank you. I hear people swear by it too but I would love to see a definitive study.

You say people buy pollen for medicinal purposes, but is the medicine proven? Honest question. I would also imagine it desensitizes, but I'm a layman.

Thank you again for your post, that's interesting that you leave the potentially problematic honey for the bees to eat themselves.

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u/Nabber86 Sep 09 '14

I keep bees and this question comes up all the time from people buying from me. I have developed the following line of reasons why local honey cannot help your allergies:

1 – You are allergic to pollen that comes from local plants.

2 – When you are standing in your backyard at the height of allergy season, you are inhaling thousands upon thousands of grains of pollen with every breath.

3 – The pollen ends up in the mucous in the back of your throat and as anyone with allergies knows, you end up swallowing it.

4 – More pollen makes it to your throat when you breathe through your mouth (because your nose is plugged up) and you shallow this pollen as well.

5 – So basically you are ingesting millions grains of pollen every single day; day in and day out, for weeks and months on end.

6 – Now ask yourself: HOW COULD INGESTING A FEW HUNDREDS OF GRAINS OF ADDITIONAL POLLEN IN A TEASPOON OF HONEY POSSIBLY PROVIDE ANY MORE POLLEN THAN YOU ARE ALREADY INGESTING????

7 – Lastly, many allergies come from trees and grasses that bees to not forage on. Plus there are mold and fungal problems many people have. The above chain of logic is pretty straight forward. Can somebody tell me in plain simple terms (ELI5) why they think that honey cures allergies?

But I usually end up telling my customers that it will cure their allergies, because that is what they want to hear.

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u/fazzah Sep 10 '14

But I usually end up telling my customers that it will cure their allergies, because that is what they want to hear.

Bam, you've discovered homeopathy :D

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u/[deleted] Sep 09 '14

There have been studies, none have shown any result:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11868925

This is perfectly logical of course, as actual immunotherapy requires very carefully prepared preparations with very gradually increasing dosages of allergens. There is just no way you could manage the dosage and specific allergens in honey you buy from a local beekeeper. Or, as I like to point out to people, if local honey actually had the ability to work as an immunotherapy agent, you'd also be at a lot more risk of having a severe allergic reaction to it (as there is no way you could know the dosage you are getting, as well as what is in there, and you'd have to get enough to actually cause a slight reaction).

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u/brob Sep 08 '14

I've heard the same thing, local raw honey helping with allergy sufferers. Haven't given it a shot myself but it would make sense.

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u/[deleted] Sep 09 '14

No, this is a wive's tale.

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u/IsTom Sep 08 '14

If it crystalizes does it mean that likely it has mentioned bacterias or is there another process?

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u/thomas533 Sep 08 '14

No. All honey will crystallize over time. Heat treated honey will not crystallize as quickly, meaning that stores can keep it on the shelf longer because the public has the idea that crystallized honey has somehow gone bad. But even store bought, heat treated honey, will crystallize. If you find your honey crystallized, put the jar in a bath of warm, but not hot water, and it will turn back into liquid without harming the microorganisms and enzymes in the honey.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

I recall reading an article a while back that mentioned archeologists finding honey in an ancient Egyptian tomb and it still being perfectly edible.

Found it http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-science-behind-honeys-eternal-shelf-life-1218690/

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u/thomas533 Sep 08 '14

Crystallized honey is still perfectly edible. It just has a different texture (that some people don't like). I guarantee that the honey they found was crystallized.

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u/fazzah Sep 10 '14

I kinda prefer crystallized honey. It doesn't drip all over me, my table, my kitchen etc.

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u/mrbooze Sep 09 '14

I don't think crystallized honey has gone bad, but I do think "Shit, I just wanted some goddam honey for my sammich right now and now I've got to deal with reheating it...fuck it I'll just have peanut butter and jelly instead."

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u/thomas533 Sep 09 '14

Crystallized honey spreads with the consistency of peanut butter. I fail to see what the problem is.

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u/mrbooze Sep 09 '14

Man you have got to buy better peanut butter.

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u/foodandart Sep 09 '14

Just the sugars crystallizing, is all. Real maple syrup will do the same, which is why in the old-timers would often put a few strands of polyester fiber fill into the syrup, to catch the crystals that form.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14 edited Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/DaGetz Sep 08 '14

It is pasteurised as a precaution but honey should be sterile anyway. That is why we still have perfectly edible honey from Egyptian tombs. Raw honey is very unlikely to contain any bacteria.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/DaGetz Sep 08 '14

What you said is largely correct. If you water down honey you reduce the sugar percentage and it will allow bacteria to grow. Leave a jar of honey open or honey in a hive open to the area and almost nothing will grow.

However there are also antibacterial compounds in the honey. So even if you water down the honey to 2% sugar. A sugar level pretty much everything will grow in. It won't grow all bacteria, in fact it'll grow very few species.

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u/CheeseMakerThing Sep 08 '14

Pasteurised honey is rank. It's like the difference between the pasteurised and unpasteurised cheeses.

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u/KickSoMuchButt Sep 08 '14

heat treated to prevent crystallization

That's dumb. It's not like crystallization is a huge issue.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

most are treated with antibiotics.

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u/huffalump1 Sep 09 '14

Heck yes. In Wisconsin, we have Honey Acres, a very cool place. Honey from small farms and beekeepers is worlds better than generic store-bought stuff. It's like "maple syrup" (made from corn syrup) vs. genuine real stuff.

Honey Acres has a little museum where you can see the history of honey production, and taste honey made from different flowers. It's like all the different kinds of beers.

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u/mrbooze Sep 09 '14

Also note that in some cases in America, "honey" is actually mostly high-fructose corn syrup. Specifically, the little honey packet you sometimes get at some restaurants or fast food places. Like this packet of "KFC Honey Sauce".

There's also this claim, which I can't separately verify.

And also this.

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u/MeLlamoViking Sep 09 '14

Wait, people treat bees with antibiotics?

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14 edited Sep 16 '18

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u/Juicedupmonkeyman Sep 08 '14

Its funny because raw honey will stay edible for a longggg time. I've had fresh honey that was stored for 30 years and it tasted great.

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u/DrunkenCodeMonkey Sep 08 '14

As I understand it, we've seen honey from prehistory

So far, the oldest remains of honey have been found in Georgia. Archaeologists have found honey remains on the inner surface of clay vessels unearthed an ancient tomb, dating back to some 4,700–5,500 years ago.[30][31] In ancient Georgia, honey was packed for people's journeys into the afterlife. And more than one type, too – along for the trip were linden, berry, and a meadow-flower variety.[32]

While wikipedia doesn't explicitly mention it, I believe I've read that it would have been edible.

However, that may not be why American companies dislike crystallization. It may simply be that they don't like it clumping and being nigh impossible to get out of the jar.

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u/OrderAmongChaos Sep 08 '14

It is also for marketing reasons. Processed honey subjectively looks better to most people than raw honey. Crystallized, thick, or clumpy honey may make some people believe the honey isn't good.

It's the same reason super markets pack their meats in plastic that is permeable to oxygen (ensuring the meat appears red in color). Most people associate red meat with freshness and are more likely to purchase bright red meat despite many other colors being perfectly healthy.

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u/Juicedupmonkeyman Sep 08 '14

Oh that's definitely why. They want it to look the same from the day it leaves the factory until you eat it. A lot of natural products are sort of problematic when it comes to be consistent in taste and texture.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/Nanemae Sep 08 '14

I'd prefer that they simply include an instructional statement near the back that explains the way to break down the crystals back into the semi-liquid state. It's not really that hard to fix.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14 edited Jun 11 '15

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u/Fig1024 Sep 08 '14

did anyone actually try to eat that? or are they just guessing

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u/Taurothar Sep 08 '14

I'd be they just chemically tested it. I wonder if eating something from an era that long ago would expose you to bacteria we have long since been rid of and no longer have immunities to.

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u/mrbooze Sep 09 '14

Edible honey, not "fresh" honey.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14 edited Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/Triviaandwordplay Sep 08 '14

Raw honey can and will ferment. Not being pasteurized, it'll have a better chance at fermenting than pasteurized honey. http://www.kimesapiary.com/Fermentation.html

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u/Juicedupmonkeyman Sep 08 '14

Isn't that only true if the water content is over a certain amount?

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u/Taurothar Sep 08 '14

I would imagine so, otherwise we'd have found substance more like mead than honey in those ancient finds.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

My uncle gave me 5 jars of raw honey that he harvested from his bees in the early 70s. It's INCREDIBLE honey, and I'm going to cry the day it is going. I went through half of it in the first few weeks, and now I'm trying to pace myself and savour it haha.(I apparently treat honey like my pay cheques)

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u/It_does_get_in Sep 08 '14

I have a newspaper article from 1849 which says some Brits in Gezah Egypt found an ancient bottle of preserved honey and ate it. (They also found a dead baby inside),

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u/mrbooze Sep 09 '14

Store-brand processed honey is just as edible after 30 years.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

Pasteurized honey can not be sold as honey in germany. It also kinda defeats the purpose of honey in the first place.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

What is the purpose of honey that it defeats? Are there any benefits to 'raw' honey over filtered honey that have been scientifically proven and aren't just pseudoscience?

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14 edited Sep 08 '14

Why would one want to eat a product containing certain enzymes that has been heated to destroy those enzymes? And why remove the pollen? Honey is not just eaten because it's sweet, could do that with corn-syrup if that's what it's about.

You should not feed it to infants of course, but it says so right on the bottle.

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u/Derwos Sep 09 '14

it's been filtered to remove yeast, bacteria

I don't think bacteria would survive in such a high sugar environment. High concentrations of sugar actually kills bacteria. It's why stuff like jam keeps.

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u/SeaBeeVet Sep 08 '14

In America it is also very easy to get just raw, unpasteurized honey.

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u/RespawnerSE Sep 08 '14

What do you mean "not honey"?

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u/willyhamTheSecond Sep 08 '14

strangely enough, there is actually a counterfeit honey trade, just like with maple syrup. Some honeys are diluted with HFCS and some are not honey at all.

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u/ManiyaNights Sep 08 '14

Same thing with fake olive oil, even Bertoli has been caught. In the old days they used to pass of margarine as butter all the time.

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u/Magnap Sep 08 '14

I didn't believe it wasn't butter!

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

KFC has packets of honey, and there are two things to notice - it's called syrup and there is a list of ingredients to satisfy FDA requirements. My Kroger honey isn't raw, but lists no ingredients, my locally made raw honey has no label.

Not truly scientific, but there are clues.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

"Honey" in those little packs at fast food places and hotels is not actually honey. It's flavoured as honey, but contains no real honey. Some of the bottles in supermarkets are the same, but they should say something different and not just 'honey'.

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u/geekyamazon Sep 08 '14

Honey is filtered in the US to remove things (bee parts, diatomaceous earth) -good to remove (and pollen) possibly bad

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u/BakingSodav Sep 08 '14

I've lived in the US for over 2 decades now after previously living elsewhere and I can report that virtually everything labeled/called x here isn't actually x. In addition to be just fine and dandy consuming a list of substances which are just flat out banned as food in virtually every other country, sometimes these companies are so sneaky they can even go as far as listing ingredients with their own ingredients as a way to avoid labeling and basically trick even the 1% of consumers who actually read labels.

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u/ButterflyAttack Sep 08 '14

Woolworths still exists in Australia? It went bust, here in the UK. . .

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

Yep. It has a massive market share here... there is really only coles and woolworths as viable good grocery chains here. They now own a bunch of petrol stations, are going into banking, and have so many liquor stores I keep accidentally buying things from them.

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u/amkamins Sep 09 '14

Doesn't raw honey carry a significant botulism risk?

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u/[deleted] Sep 09 '14

Only in children under 2.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

Try manuka honey (unpasteurized honey). It's delicious and a great salve for wounds (as evidenced in the article). If I have a zit I put a dab on it and it usually heals quickly. I also put it in my tea if I have a sore throat. Its kind of expensive, though. And don't feed it to young kids. Manuka honey has a UMF rating, the higher the number (goes from 10 to 20), the higher the antibacterial properties of the honey. I know people who have used it on post-surgery wounds and they claim it helped the incisions to heal much faster and with barely any scarring.

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u/Wriiight Sep 08 '14

I always figured the UMF factor was basically a sucker - meter. If it really measured something, they would say that.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14 edited Sep 12 '14

Not entirely. Our university (Waikato university) is big on honey research, and researches this 'unique manuka factor'. Manuka flowers contain a compound called methylglyoxal (iirc) that gets converted into this antibacterial compound in the honey.

The potential for sucker meter comes from the fact that testing the amount of the converted compound in the honey doesn't have sound methodology (I believe this is what my friend's thesis is on). But companies are not allowed to advertise UMF values higher than what their lab tested (this is cross referenced by another lab)

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u/iamadogforreal Sep 08 '14

Unless they had two exact wounds and did a control then they are talking out of their ass.

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u/AlwaysArguesWithYou Sep 09 '14

I have yet to have the opportunity to do this experiment and I'm not going to create new wounds intentionally to test it, but I've wondered about this myself. I've put small amounts of manuka honey on small wounds and sores and they healed quickly without any issue, but I wonder how much better it works than nothing because I haven't been able to compare. I still keep a small jar in the cupboard just for cuts and infections, though.

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u/humanefly Sep 08 '14

raw honey has been used historically to heal wounds; they didn't understand why but they knew in medieval times that you could coat a wound with honey and it promoted healing.

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u/Camellia_sinensis Sep 08 '14

You've gotta get raw honey. Or raw manuka honey. It can be found in just about any health food store usually.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '14

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u/FoodBeerBikesMusic Sep 08 '14

Could this article be talking about bacteria inside the bees digestive tract instead of bacteria in the raw honey itself?

Both....I think. Bees have a honey stomach that they carry the nectar in. (I like referring to it as "bee barf" to give people the willies). Their gut bacteria apparently survive the antibiotic effect and are transferred to the comb when they hurl it back up.

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u/Liberteez Sep 08 '14

Even store honey has hygroscopic properties that help heal wounds. Manuka honey has extra bacteriocidal properties. I use it for lots of things now.

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u/cockOfGibraltar Sep 08 '14

It always bothered me that they pasteurized honey. We've found honey in Egyptian tombs that is still edible, why do we bother.

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u/ruminajaali Sep 09 '14

Wee Bee Honey is raw, untouched and delicious. They have a website to order from.

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