Comments on: You can thank wasps for your bread, beer and wine

By: Brian Too

Brian Too — Sat, 04 Aug 2012 00:22:27 +0000

OK, I’ve wanted to avoid going there, but there is another way. The wasps might be pooping on the fruit. There, I said it.

By: Grant

Grant — Thu, 02 Aug 2012 16:48:40 +0000

a man from the florida keys
liked to drink whel tending his bees
He turned his honey to meade
And his meade fed his need
allergic he was
to the bees with a buzz
and died from the hives and his greed…..Denman

By: Ken

Ken — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 14:41:21 +0000

Great post, but don’t forget to include mead! I started brewing mead about two years ago, followed quickly by beer and wine – wine because it was cheaper than mead, as honey can be quite expensive here in the United States unless you go synthetic, which is bad for brewing for obvious reasons. Whenever I get around to buying a home, I’m going to do some bee (not wasp) keeping, if for no other reason than to help the poor critters out while also getting myself drunk

By: Brian Too

Brian Too — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 23:44:09 +0000

I always thought the idea was that yeast spores are pervasive in the environment. Small, durable and easily light enough to spread on the breeze.

The wasp hypothesis requires the wasp to regurgitate on the fruit, which I don’t believe is the feeding behavour of wasps.

By: Kaviani

Kaviani — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 15:19:14 +0000

Airborne yeast tetrads don’t count? They definitely get around.

By: zackoz

zackoz — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 07:47:22 +0000

For some reason this reminds me of a limerick:

There was a young man of St Bees

Who was bit on the neck by a wasp

When asked “Does it hurt?”

He said “Not a bit,

I’m thankful it wasn’t a hornet.”

(by W S Gilbert, said to be the first unrhymed limerick.)

(That’s the limerick above, not W S Gilbert).

Sorry if I’m incoherent, just socking into the shiraz before dinner.