For most people, bees may seem like a painful nuisance, but to Maryanne Frazier, senior extension associate in the entomology department, "fascinating," is a more accurate description.

Frazier specializes in apiculture, the study of bees and beekeeping. As a woman who regularly handles bees with her bare hands, she knows why bees are so important, and maybe not such an annoyance.

Honeybees are Frazier's forte. These insects are one of the 3,500 species of bees. Bees, in general, are important for plant pollination. Honeybees, however, in addition to pollinating plants, manufacture substances like honey and beeswax, which are used in many consumer products.

Honey is the most obvious of honeybee products. Part of Frazier's role as beekeeper is to maximize honey production so that the bees produce more honey than they need. Beekeepers manage manmade beehives and then harvest honey for human consumption.

Honey harvested by beekeepers is often sold to honey companies. One such company, Fisher Honey Company, is located in Lewistown. Scott Fisher, an owner of Fisher Honey, said that at his company, they "buy honey from beekeepers and then heat it up and liquefy it." The honey naturally comes in crystallized form.

Their honey then goes to distributors, grocery stores and bakeries.

"I was born into it," he said. "It's actually an offshoot because my grandfather started keeping honeybees in 1935."

Before the honey makes it to the honey companies, or even to the beekeepers, there is a lot of action in the beehive to make it possible. Making honey is a complex process.

"There's more to honey than just sugar," said Frazier.

Honeybees collect nectar from flowers, carry it to their beehives, and then fan away moisture with their wings and mouth parts. This action hastens the evaporation of water from the nectar. The bee then adds enzymes from its body to the thickened nectar, converting the sucrose into a simple sugar. The honey that results is easy for the bees to digest and stores well for food over the winter months.

The queen bee, which is the fertile female of the group, is the "key of the colony," Frazier said. The hive also houses male bees called "drones" which number in the hundreds for each hive, and infertile female worker bees which can number up to 50,000.

Worker bees do all of the maintenance in the hive, while drones compete to mate with the queen.

Drones eat nearly three times as much as do the workers in the hives and yet contribute little other than the mating function.

The drones have the shortest life span of the honeybees and die after mating.

Drones are less threatening to humans because they are incapable of stinging.

The bees with the ability to sting, however, die after stinging, leaving their stingers at the site of their victim's wounds.

There are some theories about bees that many people question.

Frazier said of a disputed bee sixth sense, "I don't think they can actually sense fear."

She said, however, that when bees are provoked, they set out an "alarm pheromone" which alerts the hive to danger. Bees become aggressive and sting under these conditions, which could be the result of a fearful beekeeper "handling the bees roughly."

When working with the insects, Frazier uses an apparatus called a "smoker" to calm the bees. The smoke covers the pheromone alert signal, controlling bee behavior.

Frazier said that when she first began handling bees, even knowing she might get stung, "My fascination overcame my fear."

Frazier also uses smoke to protect the bee sting wounds. She said that people who get stung should, "get the stinger out as soon as possible," and that adding smoke can "cover up the mark of the pheromone."

Frazier knows that some people use home remedies like meat tenderizers or mud to help relieve the pain of a sting, but said she wasn't sure that any of these remedies really helped.

Honeybees are known for producing honey, but they also contribute to products like cosmetics, which rely on waxes as essential ingredients.

Chuck Friedman is the scientific director at Burt's Bees, Inc., a cosmetics company, which uses bee products in their skincare line. He said beeswax works on human skin because it is compatible.

"Beeswax is the primary bee product we use at this point. It helps us emulsify creams and lotions," he said.

He explained that beeswax works well in cosmetic products because compounds called "wax esthers" exist in both beeswax and human skin.

Sebaceous glands in the skin produce a compound called sebum that functions to hydrate the skin. The similar structure of beeswax mimics sebum on a molecular level.

"That's the beauty of it. It's the compatibility," he said.

Friedman said that in this way, beeswax can protect against "transepidermal moisture loss," or dry skin.

Burt's Bees uses bee products instead of using synthetics like petroleum.

Friedman said that petroleum products have, "virtually no role in the nutrition of human skin."

Burt's Bees also uses royal jelly in one of its products. In nature, worker bees use royal jelly to feed the queen, who cannot feed herself. The queen's ability to produce eggs is tied to how many worker bees can feed the queen. "Royal jelly is a complete food," said Friedman.

Honey bee products range from the edible to the purely aesthetic. Students interested in learning more about bees and beekeeping may be interested in a course offered through the College of Agriculture, Entomology 015 (Beekeeping).

The course is offered every other year and will be offered again in spring semester 2004.