Honey Bees are an animal
most of us learn about very early on, one way or another. In
Summer, many people step on Honey Bees and get stung while
walking barefoot on a lawn.
Honey Bees are usually
very gentle creatures who mind their own business. They are
too busy to worry about people or other animals.
Honey Bees are normally
about 3/4 of an inch long. Most bees are workers, which are
female, but some are male, called "drones." Workers are
slightly smaller than drones. All Honey Bees are reddish
brown and black, with orangish-yellow rings on the
abdomen
(back part of body). The head,
antennae,
and legs are black. Honey Bees have thick, pale hair on the
thorax
(middle part of body).
Honey Bees live in a
nest, called a "hive." A single hive can have up to 80,000
bees, mostly workers. It is usually located in a hollow
tree.
The hive is ruled over by
a queen bee. She is the largest bee in the hive, and she is
the only female to mate. Males usually just hang around;
their only purpose is to mate with the queen. Then they die.
The workers do all of the work inside and outside of the
hive. Their jobs include: caring for larvae
(baby bees), making wax, building honeycomb, cleaning up the
hive, storing pollen,
making honey, guarding the hive, collecting pollen and
nectar.
Honeycomb is layers of
wax cells (little rooms) made into a hexagonal (six-sided)
shape. The queen will lay eggs in the cells and Honey Bee
babies, called larvae, will hatch. Larvae will eventually
pupate
(make a coccoon in their cells), and hatch out as
adult
bees.
Honey Bees eat nectar and
pollen from flowers. Nectar is the liquid in a flower, and
pollen is a powdery substance which must be transferred from
one flower to another to make more flowers. Larvae eat
honey.
Queen bees eat royal
jelly. Royal jelly is a paste made by worker
bees.
The queen lays eggs which
become either males, workers, or new queens, depending on
the time of year and the age of the hive. After she makes
new queens, she will leave the nest with some workers to
start a new hive.
The first new queen will
kill all the others, and then she will be the queen of the
old hive.
Can you see the queen
in this picture? >
When Honey Bees seek out nectar
and pollen to make honey with, they visit many different types of
flowers, including clover, dandelions, goldenrod, fruit trees, and
milkweed.
Once at the flower, the worker bee
drinks as much nectar as she can hold. When she gets back to the
hive, she passes the nectar on to another worker. This worker holds
the nectar on her tongue until the water evaporates (leaves the
nectar to go back into the air). She is left with honey on her
tongue, which is stored in the hive.
Bees eat their store of honey in
the winter, when there is no food.
When a bee finds a good place with
lots of flowers, she marks the spot with a scent. She then goes back
to the hive and does a little "dance" which tells the other bees the
distance and direction to go. This communication helps the hive
locate good places so they don't waste time always looking for
flowers.
Honey Bees are attracted to
flowers with bright colors, but they cannot see red. Plants, which
have bright flowers so that insects will pollinate
them, have to rely on some other animal (like a butterfly or
hummingbird) if they have red flowers.
When a bee enters a flower, it has
to go deep down to get to the nectar. While it drinks nectar, the bee
gets covered with pollen. The bee also collects the pollen in its
pollen basket (part of its hind legs). When the bee moves on to
another flower, some of the pollen from the first flower rubs off on
the second flower. This is pollination. Now the plant will drop its
flower and make a fruit with seeds in it. The seeds may grow into a
new plant. The bees cannot live without the plants and the plants
cannot live without the bees.
Worker bees have a stinger which
is sharp and has a barb on it (like a fishhook). The stinger is
attached to a venom
gland in the abdomen. Honey Bees only sting if they, or the hive, are
in danger. If a Honey Bee stings a wasp, because the wasp has soft
tissue, the bee can pull her stinger out and sting again. However, if
she stings an animal with tougher tissue, such as a frog or a human,
the barb gets caught and the stinger tears out of the abdomen, along
with the poison gland. This will kill the Honey Bee.
The venom is what makes the
beesting hurt. A muscle attached to the venom gland continues to pump
poison into the wound, even after the bee is gone. Beestings, are not
really dangerous unless you are allergic
to bees!
Honey Bees will usually
leave people alone, but they are attracted to some soaps,
perfumes, and hair sprays. If one comes near you, it is
probably confused. Once it realizes you have no nectar, it
will leave you alone.
Many predators
avoid Honey Bees because of their sting, but others eat
them.
The worst predator for
Honey Bees is the Varroa Mite. Varroa Mites are tiny
arachnids
(spider cousins). Varroa Mites weaken the Honey Bee's immune
system, which makes them vulnerable to diseases. The picture
to the right show Honey Bees covered with Varroa Mites (the
tiny red creatures).
* Honey Bees also
have a negative impact on nature, because they are not native to the
United States. They were brought here from Europe in the 1600's. They
directly compete with some native species of bees which are close to
becoming extinct since they must compete with Honey
Bees.
Relationship to
Humans:
Honey Bees are very important
animals. Humans rely on them to pollinate crops, especially fruit
trees such as oranges and peaches. If Honey Bees didn't transfer
pollen from flower to flower, we would have a difficult time growing
fruit! People also eat honey and use wax from honeycomb to make
candles and other products. Honey Bee venom is used to make medicine
to cure arthritis.
