# Royal Jelly??



## Konrad (Oct 7, 2004)

My Wife bought a bottle of Royal Jelly as a health supplement....good or bad??
Got me thinking, just getting into bees, how is the jelly being harvested??
Konrad


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

I've been asking that question for a while, but best I can find out it's done with a lot of hand labor. Basically you raise queen cells, except you keep stealing the royal jelly from them instead of leaving it for the queens. This can be removed with a small spatula or possibly a large bore syringe would work. I have yet to see any automated system, but I would think something that slowly sucks the royal jelly out of the bottom of plastic cups could possibly work.

If anyone knows of an automated system, please let me know, I'm still trying to find out if one exists.


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## Curry (Sep 22, 2003)

I guess that's why royal jelly production is almost exclusively done in China. If you could hire someone for 50 cents an hour, you could probably make money doing royal jelly too...

I'm glad to see that everything is made in China now so that pressure will be put on wages there... and then Bangladesh will be the only country left to move business to.


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## Konrad (Oct 7, 2004)

Thank you for everyone's posting!

Here, someone in Montana is selling Royal Jelly in Honey?
Is it a hoax? http://www.the-grizz.com/jelly/


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## hobbee (Oct 19, 2003)

He is getting good prices for his honey on his site.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

Just because someone in the US is selling royal jelly, does not mean it was collected here. I see nothing on the page that suggests it is Montana royal jelly. Just Montana honey.


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## Dick Allen (Sep 4, 2004)

Most of what is found on the internet about royal jelly seems to have been put there by people who are selling it. Heres more balanced info about royal jelly including, at the end, a brief description on its collection.
http://www.fao.org/docrep/w0076e/w0076e16.htm 

American Bee Journal (June 2000) had a detailed article on producing royal jelly written by Chinese professor Li Jianke. He writes that his 100 hives produced 710 kilos of royal jelly and 5 tons of honey in 1997 .


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## Guest (Dec 20, 2004)

I sell pollen to health-food stores, and
most of them have asked about royal jelly.

I refuse to even consider it, and I tell
them why. "Royal jelly" (more correctly,
brood food, since the only difference between
what is given a worker and what is given
to a queen is the amount of brood food) is
something made by the bees for brood, and
any colony where such things are harvested
on a large scale is going to have to keep
too many bees working on "nurse bee" duties
longer than normal, and not develop a robust
foraging force as rapidly.

Maturation rates are slowed or sped up
by external conditions. If one captures
all a hives foragers, and does not allow
them to return, younger bees, far too
young to forage under normal conditions
will step in to fill the labor gap. 
Likewise, heavy brood-rearing duties will
keep more bees working on "nurse bee duties"
longer than usual.

Needless to say, screwing around with a
hive like that leads to all sorts of
unintended consequences, and smaller harvests.


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## Dick Allen (Sep 4, 2004)

>(more correctly,brood food, since the only difference between what is given a worker and what is given to a queen is the amount of brood food)

Do you have some references for that? More of what is given to a queen comes from the mandibular glands while more of what is given to workers comes from the hypopharyngeal glands, according to what my books say. Is there newer information?


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## Konrad (Oct 7, 2004)

Thank you everyone for your input!

Dick, that's a very interesting web site!


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## Axtmann (Dec 29, 2002)

>>>>American Bee Journal (June 2000) had a detailed article on producing royal jelly written by Chinese professor Li Jianke. He writes that his 100 hives produced 710 kilos of royal jelly and 5 tons of honey in 1997 .<<<<

Dick are you sure there is not a mistake? 710 kilo of royal jelly means 7.1 kilo per hive. That would be 7 litre or almost 2 gallon of liquid royal jelly from each colony.


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## Dick Allen (Sep 4, 2004)

>are you sure there is not a mistake?
No, I'm not sure at all. I just copied what was in the article. I, too, wondered at the numbers. The 5 tons of honey sounded ok. Here's some more from the article:

"For beekeeprs with special skills in royal jelly production and colony management, 5-7 kilos of royal jelly can be collected per colony on average with the highest output being 10 kilos per colony." 

Remember, though, that's what this guy specializes in, and he selects for and rears bees having high royal jelly production.

If anyone is interested in reading the article, ABJ sells back issues of their magazine (June 2000). e-mail them at [email protected]
Or go to a library and get the article:

Jianke, L. 2000. Technology for royal jelly production. American Bee Journal 140:469-472


[This message has been edited by Dick Allen (edited December 22, 2004).]


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