What's the buzz all about?
- In a colony of bees, there lives 1 queen; a few hundred drones (the males); and thousands of female workers.
- THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH! It takes 16 days for a queen to develop from egg to adult; 21 days for a worker; and 24 days for a drone. However, a queen can live for 2-3 years; a worker from 42 days to a couple months; and a drone only a spring/summer season. A queen's longevity is attributed to the extra royal jelly she receives as an infant larva.
- SUPERMOM! A queen can lay up to 1000 eggs/day.
- BUSY AS A BEE! Worker bees raise the young; build the house (wax producers); take care of the queen; guard the hive; remove the dead; provide metabolic heat when it's cold and air conditioning when it's hot; gather the food and accumulate the reserves (nectar, pollen, propolis) needed to survive the winter...and if all goes well...provided a surplus of honey. WHEW!
- Drones cannot produce wax; cannot forage; and cannot clean house or guard the hive.
- Only worker bees sting...and it is only DEFENSIVE behaviour...not OFFENSIVE. They will then die as their stinger rips out of their abdomen and left behind in the perceived enemy. A stinger is part of a worker's underdeveloped reproductive system.
- 1 MOM AND NO DAD! Drones emerge from a unfertilized egg...his genes are only from the queen; whereas workers emerge from a fertilized egg...her genes are from both the queen and a drone.
- NO BANANAS PLEASE! The alarm pheromone emitted by bees when under perceived threat has a banana odour.
- VEGETARIAN BEES! Forager worker bees collect nectar, pollen, water and propolis (a antibacterial sticky residue substance produced by plants)...they are not meat eaters/garbage eaters like their enemies wasps and hornets.
- PROTEIN BARS! Pollen is the only source of protein, starch, fat, vitamins and minerals in a colony's diet. By weight, pollen has more protein than beef!
- YUMMY HONEY! Nectar is comprised of 80% water and 20% sugar..through enzymes produced in a bee's stomach and through evaporation by sitting in cells in the hive...it converts to 18-19% water and >80% sugar...otherwise known as HONEY!
- It takes 12 bees to make 1 tsp of honey, and 40 bees to make 1 tsp of beeswax. Think about that when you eat toast, or light a candle.
- THIRSTY BEES! A summer colony of bees need at least 1 litre of water every day.
- BRRRR..IT'S COLD OUTSIDE! Even in winter, bees maintain the hive temperature at 35 degrees celsius..however they do so by staying in a cluster. This ball of bees uses their wing muscles to generate heat...at the edge of the cluster...it could be 7 degrees. These bees will trade spots to help keep all alive and warm.
- SOCIAL NETWORK INDEED!! Excellent at communication...bees do so inside a pitch black hive through touch, feel, and smell. Outside foraging bees navigate by light, sight, colour and location.
- WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD WITH BEES! Without bees to pollinate our plants, we would basically have a plain diet of rice and corn! Bees are responsible for 1/3 of the food we humans eat. We would also have no beeswax candles, no beautiful bouquets of flowers, and of course no sweet honey!
- DOWN WITH PESTICIDES! All bees, including honey bees, are under threat by the ever increasing use of chemical pesticides in our gardens and in mass agricultural use. Their habitat needs to be protected at all cost for fear of losing an essential being that makes our world a better place!