http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/B/bee_castes.gif
The queen is the largest bee.
She is female but functionally
bisexual. She lives about 3
years depending on the number
of sperm she collected. There is
generally only 1 queen in the
hive.
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The drone is a medium-sized
bee. He is male. There are no
drones in winter but a few
hundred may be in the hive in
summer. They live just the three
months of summer at most.
The workers are small, generally
sterile female bees. A small hive
may have 20,000 workers! They
live at most six months.
Morphology of a honeybee
abdomen
thorax
wings
head
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antennae
3 pairs of segmented legs on thorax
http://is.tc.cc.tx.us/~mstorey/honeybee.jpg
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http://www.beemaster.com/honeybee/image950.JPG
This diagram shows the
queen laying a zygote
(labeled egg…drat!)
which hatches into a
larva.
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http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/C/comb_section.gif
The larva is fed honey and
bee bread (pollen mixture
with worker saliva). The
larva grows and is sealed
into its cell.
The larva rests in the form
of a pupa. The pupa eats
through the wax cap and
emerges as an adult.
The queen bee is larger. Her wings are disproportionately short
and her abdomen disproportionately large.
Although it may appear
that the worker bees
around her are “waiting
upon her,” the fact is that
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she stays on the brood
comb laying eggs. They
herd her around like a
cow keeping her working
http://www.fcps.k12.va.us/StratfordLandingES/Ecology/Insects/honeybee/queenb.jpg
365/24/7.
What is not visible here is that the queen makes a pheromone
chemical (body odor) that keeps these workers disinterested in
laying their own eggs and keeping them on worker duties.
The old queen is running out of sperm and therefore is not
producing enough pheromone. The workers put one of her
worker zygotes into a special queen cell, feed it richer food, and
the emerging daughter will be a queen. Upon hatching, she
assassinates any developing sisters, then hunts down Mom!
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http://www.beemaster.com/honeybee/imageI1C.JPG
When the daughter queen
meets up with mother
queen, the battle usually
ends in Mom’s death.
http://www.beemaster.com/honeybee/bigswrm.jpg
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But if Mom is still young
enough to put up a good
fight, the battle ends in a
draw. In that case, Mom
usually leaves home with
all of her worker bees.
The swarm flies, resting in
some places as shown here,
but ultimately finding a
new home in a cavity.
The daughter queen gets
the old hive cavity and its
emerging workers.
The drone honeybee is larger, blockier and male.
It is the best flyer, has the best vision, and scent detection.
Its only function is to mate with the queen.
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http://www.roctronics.com/BEE-MALE.JPG
Workers feed and tolerate drones
during the summer months, but any
who do not mate before fall are
starved to death at the hive entrance.
Drones catch up with the
queen, mount her, using the
hind legs remove any previous
drone’s endophallus, inserts his
own, ejaculates, and pushes
away.
Upon mating, the drone’s
endophallus and attached
internal organs are ripped out of
his abdomen. He is dead before
he reaches the ground
These workers are
ventilating the hive.
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They are building the
hexagonal walls of
the honeycomb cells.
As worker-gatherers
arrive from the field
they receive the
nectar to evaporate
into honey.
http://www.biol.lu.se/funkmorf/vision/eric/tempresproj1.jpg
In the darker brood comb areas, the workers clean out the cells,
feed larvae, cap pupae, and continue the ventilation functions.
Also in this area a group of workers herd the queen to the empty
brood cells, feed the queen, and someday may steal a zygote to
surreptitiously make a new queen!
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http://www.bcpl.net/~sullivan/modules/zoo/images/honeybee.jpg
Gathering workers also collect water
and plant resins (propolis).
Here a worker is in
action gathering
nectar, licking it
from the flowers
with its glossa
(tongue).
She is also gathering
pollen by preening
her bristles with
combs on her legs
and packing it in the
hairs on her hind legs
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Beekeeping/honeybee.gif
As the worker moves in closer to lick out
the nectar, she will get the pollen from
those stamens on her body.
This worker has been out collecting
and is returning with a full crop of
nectar and the bristles of her legs are
packed with yellow pollen.
http://www.govlink.org/hazwaste/house/images/honeybee.jpg
This worker is visiting a
dayflower. The two blue
petals and the yellow stamens
make a nice attraction. At the
moment of this photograph,
the stigmas are contacting the
body of the honeybee, picking
up any pollen the bee had
stuck to her hairy body from a
previously visited flower.
Anatomy of a honeybee:
http://www.beemaster.com/honeybee/beexray.gif
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The stinger’s venom sac
contracts and pulsates,
injecting its venom into the
victim.
Best to brush this away
rather than squash it and
give yourself a large dose!
When a bee stings, the stinger
is pulled out from her body,
digs its way in with muscular
contraction, and the venom sac
injects the poisons into the
victim. Of course the honeybee
hemorrhages to death upon
stinging the victim!
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Ranunculus acris has rather plain
yellow flowers to us.
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The buttercup demonstrates its
strong bullseye target in the UV
http://www.naturfotograf.com/UV_RANU_ACR.html
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Hepatica nobilis is a blue flower
with white stamens and
carpels…to a bee these absorb
UV and thus the targets
translates to yellow instead!
http://www.naturfotograf.com/UV_HEPA_NOB.html
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Potentilla atrosanguinea is
a red flower which also has
strong UV targets on each
petal.
http://www.naturfotograf.com/UV_POTE_ATR.html#top
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Oenothera biennis has
beautiful UV nectar guides
http://www.naturfotograf.com/UV_OENO_BIE.html#top
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Angelica sylvestris nectaries
absorb UV strongly providing
the bull’s eye target very
specifically!
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The nectary actually fluoresces
when illuminated with UV light
http://www.naturfotograf.com/UV_ANGE_SYL.html
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