Honeycomb in Starsand Island presents a classic chicken-and-egg problem. You need it to craft a Beehive on your farm, but the crafted Beehive is what produces honey. The solution is finding wild beehives hanging in the branches of certain trees scattered across the map — though spotting them is trickier than it sounds.
Quick answer: Chop down Banyan or White Fig trees that have small yellow beehives hanging from their branches. Picking up the fallen hive gives you Honeycomb and usually a few Bumblebees. The best farming spots are Windflute Island (southwest of Blue Beach) and the forest west of Cloudrest Lake.
Where to Find Wild Beehives
Wild beehives spawn attached to specific tree types and can be extremely hard to see. They appear as small yellow shapes nestled among branches, and they often don't render until you're very close or viewing from the right angle. If you're scanning treetops and coming up empty, try walking right up to the trunk — the leaf canopy fades at close range, revealing the branches underneath.
Two tree species carry beehives. Banyan Trees are medium-sized and hold Small Beehives. Cutting them down requires at least an Impact Axe. White Fig trees are much larger and can drop either Small or Large Beehives, but they need a Machete to fell, which requires Intermediate Crafting skills to unlock.
The most reliable locations for wild beehives are:
- Windflute Island — a small island southwest of Blue Beach that you can swim to. Multiple Banyan Trees here carry Small Beehives.
- West of Cloudrest Lake — the path near the bridge has clusters of large White Fig trees. These are the best sources of Large Beehives and Queen Bees, though a Machete is required.
- Between the Exploration Club and Cloudrest Lake — White Fig trees along this path frequently spawn hives, including occasional Large Beehives.
- Bastram Heights — the monastery area in the northern part of the island, near Youfang's residence, has several trees with hives.
- Near the Panda Enclosure — a hive reportedly respawns on one of the play platforms here.
- Between Zephyria's house and Pastelle's Ranch, scattered hives appear in the northern forest between these two residences.
If you're struggling to spot hives visually, a brute-force approach works: chop down every large tree you find in these areas. Many players have reported collecting significant amounts of Honeycomb without ever seeing the hives before the trees fell.
Small Beehives vs. Large Beehives
Beehives come in two sizes, and the drops differ meaningfully. Small Beehives yield at least one Honeycomb and typically a couple of Bumblebees. Large Beehives give more Honeycomb and have a chance to drop a Queen Bee, which is essential for breeding more Bumblebees on your farm. Large Beehives appear to be rarer overall and are primarily found on giant White Fig trees.
Beehives do not appear to be seasonal. Players have found them during Autumn and other seasons at the same locations, though spawn rates may vary, and some players have noticed fewer hives appearing over time in certain spots.
How to Catch Bumblebees
Beyond the Bumblebees you get from chopping hive trees, you can catch them with a net. They tend to hover around flowers near Zephyria's house in the northwest part of the island. Bumblebees don't fly fast, but approach them at walking speed rather than running — sprinting will cause them to scatter before you can swing.
Note that the Velbee (the blue insect found in the Mystic Forest) is a decorative bug, not a farm bee. It cannot be placed in a crafted Beehive.
Crafting a Beehive
The Beehive blueprint unlocks once you reach the Intermediate Rancher level at Green Pasture Ranch. You'll need to purchase the blueprint from Pastelle's shop. The crafting recipe requires:
| Material | Quantity |
|---|---|
| Honeycomb | 6 |
| Hardwood Plank | 6 |
| Iron Sheet | 3 |
Place the finished Beehive on your home lot. It has 13 open slots for bees and can store up to 800 Honey and 20 Royal Jelly at once. Bumblebees placed inside will actively gather nectar from nearby flowers between 6:00 AM and 6:00 PM (some in-game descriptions list 7:00 to 19:00). Outside those hours, the bees stay bundled up inside the hive.
Queen Bees and Royal Jelly
A Queen Bee is optional but valuable. She doesn't collect honey — her role is reproduction. Place her in the Beehive and feed her Royal Jelly, and she'll periodically produce new Bumblebee workers. A Queen Bee takes up seven of the hive's 13 slots and needs at least one empty slot to generate a new bee.
Queen Bees primarily come from Large Beehives found on White Fig trees, particularly in the area west of Cloudrest Lake. They sell for 400 Coins if you'd rather cash out, but keeping one active in your hive is the most efficient way to scale up your bee population.
To make Royal Jelly, place one Egg and five Honeycombs into a Feeder machine. Royal Jelly itself is a lucrative artisan product worth 226 Coins per bottle, so there's a real trade-off between feeding it to your Queen and selling it outright.
Collecting and Using Honey
Once your Bumblebees have worked their shift, you collect Honey from the hive the same way you gather products from animal enclosures — just interact with it. Honey can be used in cooking recipes or sold for income. Unlike most other farm animals in Starsand Island, Bumblebees don't need to be fed to produce. They work 12 hours a day at essentially zero ongoing cost, making beekeeping one of the more profitable passive activities on the island.
Honeycomb itself sells for 30 Coins per piece, but given how central it is to getting your beekeeping operation running — and how tedious it can be to gather — it's worth holding onto every piece until you've built at least one Beehive. After that, surplus Honeycomb can go toward Royal Jelly production or be sold freely.
Beekeeping in Starsand Island is one of those systems that's easy to overlook entirely until a recipe or quest suddenly demands Honeycomb. The initial gathering phase requires patience and a willingness to fell a lot of trees, but once your first Beehive is up and stocked with bees, the honey flows with minimal effort. Focus your early tree-chopping runs on Windflute Island if you only have an Impact Axe, then graduate to the White Fig grove west of Cloudrest Lake once you've unlocked the Machete for a shot at Queen Bees and larger hauls.