Interesting Honey Bee Facts Custom Search Honey bee facts, facts about honey bees, there is so much to know! Just about everyone is familiar with honey bees. The fact that they are flying insects who provide us with honey is common knowledge. But did you know these facts? There are in fact only seven species of honey bee we recognize with a total of 44 subspecies. Interesting as there are in fact 20,000 types of bees!
America is a HUGE place, however there are no species of honey bees to originate from there, European colonists introduced the bee In 1622 which surprised the Natives who named them "The White Man's Fly" Honey bee facts, probably because they make honey are quoted in the Bible sixty one times and twice in the Quran. Some interesting honey bee facts include that they bear the distinction of being the only insect that produces food for human consumption. Which give us the benefits of eating honey. The buzz we hear when a bee flies by is a result of honey bees stroking their wings at 11,400 times per minute. By the exalhation of air from their thorax bees can make a variety of sounds. The virgin queen is said to make piping sounds as she emerges from her cell, nurse bees warble when producing too much "bee milk" and the workers hiss if their hive is knocked or disturbed. These facts about honey bees are not well known! They can fly as fast as 15 to 18 miles per hour and have been known to fly as much as 6 miles away from their bee hives in search of pollen but usually stay within a 2 to 4 mile radius. Those who are involved in large scale beekeeping need to be aware of this! A single colony, approximately 20,000-60,000 bees, can gather as much as 66 pounds of pollen a year. This is needed for plant pollination and for us to enjoy the benefits of bee pollen. Other honeybee facts include they have 2 pairs of wings, 6 legs (this makes them an insect) and 5 eyes. They are the only bee that has hairy compound eyes which they can also use to see ultra-violet light. Its skeleton is actually on the outside of its body with breathing holes! They cannot hear, they rely on their antennae which contain powerful sense organs with which they touch and smell. Their tongues are known as a proboscis, the female worker bees are much longer having adapted this way in order to collect nectar from plants. The brains of worker honey bees, measuring only a cubic millimeter, has the densest neuropile tissue of all animal species. Given the work that they do this is a very interesting honey bee fact. They collect Propolis, hmm What is Propolis? from the sap of trees and plants and use this to disinfect and seal any cracks in their hives. The honey bee queen is the only bee that is sexually developed which enables her to give birth. This is due to a special diet of the benefits of royal jelly. It is yet another honey bee fact that only the queen eats this throughout her entire life. Interesting honey bee facts include the way these bees communicate with each other using a series of bee dances, elaborate movements which indicate where to find food. Another fact is they are considered mathematical geniuses, take a look at their honey combs incredible pure works of art! Yet another fact is that drones have no stingers so they can never sting you. When the nest is threatened, the worker bees who are female use their stingers to protect the nest from danger. After a bee stings, they die, this is because their stinger is barbed and they have to disembowel themselves to be able to fly away. Except in cases of allergic reaction, their sting is rarely fatal to humans. A human would have to sustain around 1,100 stings for it to be fatal. If they sting the outer skeleton of another bee they can sometimes manage to fly away without harm to themselves. The only real exception is the honey bee queen she can continously sting you if she so desires! She also produces powerful pheromones, which are chemical signals to the other bees which enable the control many of their behaviours While many conjure up thoughts of killer honeybee swarms and can't imagine why anyone would purposely concentrate on attracting bees by growing their own honey bee gardens, the truth is that most bees aren't as aggressive as is commonly believed. Honey Bees aren't overly interested in stinging people and don't seek out a confrontation. When bees do sting it is because someone has interrupted their flight path, which is why it is best to simply move out of the bee's way and allow it to pass whenever your paths converge. Don't make any sudden loud noises either, this frightens them! There are practises involved called bee sting treatment which people use via a professional, this is said to be effective for a variety of ailments, however, please don't try this at home! Little known facts about honey bees are that it is the Workers who are responsible for the majority of work in their colonies. They keep the nest at a steady 92-93 degree temperature, regardless of outside temperatures. Worker bees live four to eight weeks. In contrast, the queen lives two to three years and some have been known to live as long as six. Honey bee facts have proved they have an unusual genetic sex determination system known as haplodiploidy. It is the honey queen bee who controls the flow of sperm to fertilize an egg when she is about to lay an egg. Worker bees are produced from fertilized eggs and have a full set of chromosomes. The males, or drones, develop from unfertilized eggs and are thus haploid with only a single set of chromosomes. Approximately 556 bee workers gathering from 2 million flowers are necessary to make 1 pound of raw honey and organic. This includes the fact they will have to fly around almost twice around the world in distance to acheive this! Other facts include them visiting 50 to 100 flowers a day while gathering. The average bee whilst making honey will only make one twelfth of a teaspoon of honey during its entire lifetime. In the USA they pollinate well in excess of 100 types of crops for organic honey ranging from fruits, nuts, and vegetables. It is estimated that bee plant pollination adds approximately 14+ billion dollars annually to the countries agricultural produce. We benefit from honey for the health benefits of honey because thses are huge and the medical benefits of honey are now recognized by modern doctors for vast purposes. They are normally herbivores if foraging however, they will cannibalize their own brood if stressed. There are two favourite types of bees which are used in the production of honey. Honey bees make bees wax from eight small wax glands on the underside of the abdomen and they need to eat around 8 pounds of honey to produce 1 pound of beeswax. If you would like to read a short history about honey bees and some more amazing honey bee facts please read my article about honey bees. Top of Page Please use my Site Map for Easy Navigation or alternatively: Custom Search
|
