Honey Bee

Introduction to the European Honey Bee

The European honey bee and their stages of life are very interesting to say the least.  We have different honey bees who have different jobs at different stages of life…

Drone – Procreates with virgin queen

Worker Bee – Has multiple stages of different work throughout their life

Queen Bee – Regulates the colony with pheromones, and produces offspring

If you’re not sure what kind of bee you’re looking at, in most cases they are honey bees.

Queen bees lay up to 2,000 eggs daily and can live for up to 5 years.  In conclusion if you are keeping bees it’s best to re-queen every two years.  The queen can easily be identified.  She has a visibly larger abdomen and she will walk straight through the brood while the worker bees walk over each other.

Finally, worker bees have multiple responsibilities.  Responsibilities go in stages with their age. Life span of a honeybee is 4 months in the winter and 6 weeks in the summer.  They literally work themselves to death in the summer.  Their stages of responsibilities are…

• 1-3 Days: Cleans and polishes the cell the honeybee hatched from.
• 4-10 Days: Feed and nurse the larvae and tends to the queen.
• 11-16 Days: Build wax comb and cap off the cells with pupae and honey.
• 17-19 Days: Carries out food exchange by collecting from foraging bees.
• 20-21 Days: Guards the entrance of the hive.
• 20-22 Days: Looks for pollen, nectar, water, propolis