The Life Cycle of Honeybees 1 The Life Cycle of Honeybees by George Winsom English 9 Honors Secret Life of Bees 2

The Honeybee (Apis mellifera) Recognizable pattern4 Stinger defense Only females Used once Barbed 5 Unique body structure6 Segmented Exoskeleton Compound eyes 7 100’s simple eyes 3 Bees have a clear and recognizable pattern on their bodies Bright to warn potential predators and other bees that they have a weapon to defend themselves Stinger is a modified egg-laying tube, or ovipositer, combined with a venom gland When a bee stings, the stinger, the venom sac, as well as other part of the bee are ripped out, causing the bee to die. The barbed stinger causes it to move deeper into the skin if not removed. Head- antennae (feel, smell, taste sensors), eyes, mouthparts, thorax- center of the body where 2 pairs of wings and 3 pairs of legs are attached, abdomen-contains reproductive organs and organs needed for survival, but bears not important features on the outside. Have a rigid exoskeleton made of chitin and covered with layers of wax to prevent the bees from losing water. They have no internal bones. Each facet sends an image to the brain creating a mosaic –like image. This makes the compound eyes of a bee better suited for motion detection.

The Hive The Social Order 21 The Castes Queen 2-8 years Workers 6 weeks Drones 8 weeks9 Picture of a hive in nature, a wild hive. Domestic hives can have up to 80,000. - they make a great deal of honey during the spring and summer so that they can metabolize the honey to stay alive in the winter - workers live 6 week if they are born in the spring, but if they are born in the fall they will live until the next spring. 8

Drone Bees 10 Males Larger eyes 11 0-200 in hive Sole purpose mate with queen12 Die after mating Kicked out Drones are male bees. Larger eyes for seeing the virgin queen on her “nuptial flight” Queen produces thousands of eggs, some become more drones, some workers - If there is no new queen the drones are driven from the hive and left to die -Have no stinger Drones lack the organs to collect nectar or feed themselves

Development of a Bee 13 Egg Larvae Pupa Adult 3 days 4 days Few days Egg laid: takes three days to be recognizable -larvae : feeds, grows, and molts (open cell) -pupa: resting stage in a capped cell -adult: are still cared for by workers for 1-2 days until they can care for themselves - the entire process takes from 16-24 days depending on the season, and the class of the bee 13

Worker Bees 14 Female sterile Necessary tasks Age related 2 days -workers are sterile females (only fertile female is one bee: the queen) -make up majority of the hive and perform all necessary tasks to keep hive thriving younger bees are called house bees because of their work inside the hive Older bees called field bees because they work outside the hive Tasks depend on age of bee: 2 days: cell cleaning 3-10 days: queen care, nursing, wax work(building) 15-20 days: wax work, nectar work(making honey), guarding 21-35 days: foraging(nectar, pollen) , colony defense -workers are literally “worked to death” 14

Queen Bee 15 Only fertile Lays eggs17 Pheromones18 Virgin Queen 19 Royal jelly16 Lays eggs17 Pheromones18 Virgin Queen 19 Nuptial Flight When larvae the queen is feed royal jelly made by the nurse worker bees. It is more refined, and is nutrient rich. Queen largest lays up to 1,500 eggs a day. Consumes all of her time, has to be fed by other workers every so often. If she stops laying eggs at any point in time, the workers will start to produce another queen. has a curved stinger without barbs that can be used multiple times. Lifespan depends on egg production -pheromones secreted by queen to attract drones; in addition, she produces a special pheromone that the workers tending her receive and then spread around the rest of the hive that inhibits them from producing eggs A virgin queen is a hatched queen larvae that hasn't mated with a drone. Don’t secrete pheromones and aren’t recognized to be the queen. Virgin queens will kill each other after hatching. - the nuptial flight is made when there is only one queen. She will leave the hive for a brief period of time to mate with 12-15 drones. If the weather is bad, or she is unable to mate, she will only lay drones, which will ultimately lead to the death of the colony. 15

How is Honey Made? 20 When worker bees are about 20 days old, they leave hives to collect pollen which is brought back to the hive. Here you can see a bee with a neon yellow sac of pollen on her legs, returning to the hive. At other times, worker bees leave the hive to collect nectar, the sweet secretion produced by the glands of flowers. The bee penetrates the flower's petals and sucks the nectar out with its tongue and deposits the nectar into its honey sac or abdomen. As the nectar journeys through the bee's body, water is drawn out and into the bee's intestines. The bee's glandular system emits enzymes that enrich the nectar. When the worker bee cannot hold anymore nectar, she returns to the hive. The processed nectar, now on its way to becoming honey, is deposited into empty honeycomb cells. Other worker bees ingest the honey, adding more enzymes and further ripening the honey. When the honey is fully ripened, it is deposited into a honeycomb cell one last time and capped with a thin layer of beeswax. Bee keepers will check the hives for full cells in the supers and remove the supers when they are full in order to collect the honey and process it for bottling. Empty supers are replaced in the hive for workers to refill with honey. An average bee colony produces 60-100 lb (27.2-45.4 kg) of honey each year. each one collecting about one teaspoon of nectar. One pound (0.454 kg)of honey requires 4 lb (1.8 kg) of nectar, which requires two million flowers to collect. 22

Credits 1"Honeybee." 19 May 2007 <http://brownback.senate.gov/ Honeybee.htm>. 2Rechtfertig, Mary A. "Buddy Activities." 19 May 2007 <http://dixiesd.marin.k12.ca.us/dixieschool/classrooms/Rechtfertig/honeybee.jpg>. 3"Honey Bee Facts Page." Koday's Kids Amazing Insects. 1 Jan. 1998. 20 May 2007 <http://www.ivyhall.district96.k12.il.us/4TH/KKHP/1insects/honbeefax.html>. 4Huang, Zachary. "Honey Bee Anatomy." BeeBiology. 15 Feb. 2005. Michigan StateUniversity. 20 May 2007 <http://www.cyberbee.net/>.

Credits (continued) 5Dave, Langston. "Information Sheet 2." The Honey Bee Body. University of Arizona. 20 May 2007 <http://cals.arizona.edu/pubs/insects/ahb/inf2.html>. 6www.cyberbee.net 7Mason, Jim. "Honeybee." Great Plains Nature Center. 20 May 2007 <http://www.gpnc.org/honeybee.htm>. 8Koning, Ross E. "Honeybee Biology". Plant Physiology Website. 1994. 20 May 2007 http://plantphys.info/ plants_human/bees/bees.html 20 May 2007. 9http://www.gpnc.org/honeybee.htm 10http://plantphys.info/plants_human/bees/bees.html

Credits (continued) 11Kendall, David. "Kendall Bioresearch Services." 6 June 2005. 20 May 2007 <http://www.kendall-bioresearch.co.uk/HYMEN5.GIF>. 12http://www.gpnc.org/honeybee.htm 13http://plantphys.info/plants_human/bees/bees.html 14www.cyberbee.net 15"Honey." Answers.Com. 20 May 2007 <http://www.answers.com/topic/honey>. 16Gustofsson, P O. 20 May 2007 <http://www.vegetus.org/honey/queen2.jpg>.

Credits (continued) 17http://plantphys.info/plants_human/bees/bees.html 18http://www.ivyhall.district96.k12.il.us/4TH/KKHP/1insects/honbeefax.html 19"Queen Bee." Wikipedia. 17 May 2007. 20 May 2007 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_bee#Development>. 20www.answers.com/topic/honey 21 www.matrifocus.com/LAM07/beekeeping.htm 22 http://www.berniesbeebuzz.com/album.html 23http://www.berniesbeebuzz.com/recipes.html 24 http://jamesstarmer.com/food/honey-butter/

For Fun 24 23 Honey Butter Recipe 1/4 cup butter/margarine 1/2 cup honey Bring the butter/margarine to room temperature. Blend butter/margarine and honey in a bowl until mixture is smooth and creamy. Use in place of butter/margarine on bread, biscuits, muffins, or dinner rolls. Tip: Add 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon powder to recipe for a flavorful treat! 24 Some bee keepers have web sites and this is a simple but delicious recipe from one of the best sites I found: Bernie’s BeeBuzz 23

The End 1 2 1. Picture from:http://brownback.senate.gov/Honeybee.htm