Out of the darkness

Yes, it's corny, but I've got my excuses ready, not least that it's Christmas Eve and I laced the mulled wine with cheap brandy. A second line of defence is that our bees produced the wax, we harvested it from the hive and Mrs M made the candle so, at the very least, it's home-grown corn

An individual bee spends the first 3 weeks of its life in the hive, before graduating to the status of 'flying bee' - leaving the colony to collect pollen, nectar, water, tree resin or to defend the colony or dispose of corpses. During the 2nd and 3rd week, its body is in a condition to produce wax. This is exuded from glands on the underside of the abdomen, specifically in the areas where adjacent sections of the abdomen overlap. The flakes of wax are removed by other bees, chewed using their mandibles to soften it, and then placed where it is required - most often to create the familiar hexagonal cells of 'honeycomb'. I put quotes because the comb may be used to store honey, but may also be used to raise new bees - the Queen laying an egg in the bottom and the nurse bees then adding food for the growing larva

When they are producing wax for new comb, bees festoon themselves between two points in the hive in multi-bee necklaces, hanging like trapeze artists, with inter-locked legs - each daisy-chain typically consisting of 6 or 8 bees. Occasionally, we catch them at it when we do inspections of the colonies. It is a charming sight, like watching children in a playground, but I've never heard an explanation of how it helps with wax production or comb building. One day I'll post a Blip of it - it would be a good one for May Day!

Everything I have described happens in the dark, of course, mediated only by touch, vibration and chemical signals

We don't actively search for wax to harvest; it is a by-product of other operations like removing old combs (for health reasons) and letting the bees build new ones, or of honey harvesting. To get honey out of honeycomb cells, we first have to remove the cap of wax that bees put over the top of each cell to prevent moisture getting to the honey. We do this with a specially designed fork; some people use heated knives. The cappings have some honey sticking to them; we filter that off to be bottled and are left with wax that can be washed, then melted in a water-bath and poured into moulds to make candles

If a Christmas Eve story needs something a little mysterious, a little miraculous and a little enlightening, I think it can also carry a corny illustration