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Honey Bee Fact Page

The honeybee, one of man's oldest insect friends, gives us honey, beeswax and most important of all, the fertilization of many of our cropbearing plants. The honeybee is a social insect living in large colonies of from 20,000 to 80,000 individuals. There are five species of honeybees known: Apis mellifera (common honeybee); Apis dorsata (giant honeybee); Apis laboriosa (giant honeybee); Apis cerana (Indian honeybee) and Apis florea (dwarf honeybee).

The common honeybee is found worldwide and consists of a number of races or subspecies. There are four subspecies of the common honeybee occurring in Europe, three oriental subspecies and 12 African subspecies. These races vary in their nature. Italian bees are generally gentle creatures, whereas German bees are agressive. However, it should be noted that even the normally gentle Italian bee, when provoked, will try to sting you. The weather often affects the temper of bees, and on windy, cloudy days, when they are unable to search for nectar, pollen, etc, they are somewhat angry or frustrated, and they may "take it out" on some innocent passerby.

One honeybee with a nasty disposition is the hybrid Brazilian honeybee. This hybrid resulted when African bees brought to Brazil in 1956 escaped and bred with native bees. The African bees were imported to improve production in the bee keeping industry. African bees are very industrious, foraging, or searching for food, earlier in the day and working longer in the evening. They also can work at higher or lower temperatures and thus produce more honey per year than the European species. However, they are very aggressive, sting with little provocation and chase their victims up to 328 feet. (Italian bees will normally only chase about 33 feet). Right now the Africanized bees are widespread in South Africa. They have become established in Mexico, and should already be established in Texas. A swarm of them were transported to Southern California in 1985, but they were destroyed. The effect of this bee on the United States beekeeping industry is uncertain. Also uncertain is how far north they will be able to survive.

The Castes. Three types of individuals, or castes, can at one time or another be found in a honeybee colony, including the queen (a fertile female), workers (infertile female) and drones (male). There is only one egg-laying queen in a hive. Most of the colony is made up of workers who build and repair the hive, search for nectar and pollen, produce wax and honey, feed the young and protect the hive against enemies. Worker bees are unmated females. The males have but one purpose in life and that is to mate with virgin queens. Once they have done this they die. Drones buzz ferociously, but lack a sting and are entirely harmless.

The Bee Sting. Most people who fear bees, do so because of their painful sting. When the bee stings, the stinger, poison sac and several others parts of the bee's anatomy are torn from the bee's body. It soon dies, a fact that offers little relief to the person who is stung. The action of the sting takes place almost instantaneously. The sting has barbs on it, and if it is not immediately removed, the reflex action of the muscles attached to the sting drive it deeper and deeper into the skin. This gives more time for the discharge of poison from the poison sac. The pain from the sting is increased by the discharge of toxin.

Different individuals are affected in different ways by bee stings. Some of the things that cause the differences are the part of the body that is stung, the amount of poison that has entered into the system and the natural immunity of the individual. The actual pain from the bee sting doesn't last long and it is the after effects - the swelling and itching - that are the most disturbing. Some individuals are naturally immune and do not swell, while others are so badly affected by bee sting they may be confined to bed for a number of days. In some instances, the sting of a bee may result in red blotches on the skin, nausea, fainting and even death! The stinger of a bee, as was previously mentioned, has barbs on it, and thus remains in the skin. At times, complications may result from the sting being embedded in the skin. For this reason, an effort should be made to remove the entire stinger.

The western honeybee, or hivebee, also builds its nest of many combs in sheltered places and is found in the United States, Europe, and Africa. Colonies kept in hives yield an average of 23 kg (50 pounds) of honey.

Unlike other bees, honeybees do not hibernate during cold weather. They last out the rigors of northern winters by feeding on stored supplies and sharing their body heat, clustering together in dense packs.

Socialization is most advanced in honeybees. As new, young queens are about to emerge in an established hive, half of the colony leaves with the old queen and clusters on a nearby bush or tree while scout bees search for a new home. When the scouts appear to agree on a new location, the swarm departs. At the old nest, meanwhile, the first queen to emerge disposes of the other queens (by stinging them) before they have a chance to emerge. Within a few days, the virgin queen will fly to where drones assemble, and mate with 6 to 12 drones. The sperm from these drones is stored in a sac (spermatheca) and used during her egg-laying life of from two to five years or a maximum of nine.

DRONES AND WORKERS

Drones develop by parthenogenesis from unfertilized eggs that the queen produces by withholding sperm from the eggs laid in large drone cells. Drones lack stings and the structures needed for pollen collection; in the autumn they are ejected by the colony to starve, unless the colony is queenless. New drones are produced in the spring for mating.

Both queens and workers are produced from fertilized eggs. Queen larvae are reared in special peanut-shaped cells and fed more of the pharyngeal gland secretions of the nurse bees (bee milk or royal jelly) than the worker larvae are. The precise mechanism for this caste differentiation is still uncertain. Although workers are similar in appearance and behavior to other female bees, they lack the structures for mating. When no queen is present to inhibit the development of their ovaries, however, workers eventually begin to lay eggs that develop into drones.

PHEROMONES

The integrity of the colony is maintained by chemical secretions, or PHEROMONES. Workers secrete pheromones from the so-called Nasanov gland at the tip of the abdomen when they cluster, enter a new nesting site, or mark a source of nectar or water. The colony scent is recognizable by bees of the same colony because of its unique combination of components derived from the colony's particular collections of nectar and pollen.

When queens fly to mate, a mandibular-gland pheromone attracts the drones. The same gland produces another pheromone, called queen substance, which workers lick from the queen's body and pass along as they exchange food with one another. The eaten pheromone inhibits the ovaries of workers; when the queen's secretion is inadequate, the colony produces queen cells to supersede her.

The mandibular, or mouth glands of workers produce an alarm odor, which serves to alert the colony when it is disturbed. Workers also produce a sting odor, which is released at the site of the sting and serves to direct other bees to the sting area. Stingless bees bite leaves at intervals along their flight path to provide a scent trail of mandibular secretions.

DANCE LANGUAGE

The ability of honeybees to communicate direction and distance from the hive to nectar sources through dance "language" has received widespread attention. In 1973, Karl von FRISCH received a Nobel Prize for deciphering the language, which consists of two basic dances: a dance in a circle, for indicating sources without reference to specific distance or direction; and a tail-wagging dance in which the exact distance is indicated by a number of straight runs with abdominal wagging--the fewer runs per minute, the farther away the source. Wing vibrations produce sounds at the same rate as the tail wagging and are detected by organs in the legs of other bees. Researchers have developed a robot "bee" that can communicate with other bees in this way.

The various species of Apis, and races of honeybees, indicate a particular distance by a different dance tempo. This may lead the individuals in colonies with a mixture of races to misunderstand messages about the distance to a feeding site. Stingless bees communicate only by sounds.

The direction, or azimuth, to the food source is indicated by the angle of the wagging dance to the Sun. That is, bees use the Sun as a compass, orienting the dance angle to the plane of polarization of the sunlight. Even when the Sun is obscured by clouds, bees can detect its position from the light in brighter patches of the sky. Ultraviolet designs in flowers serve as nectar guides to blooms in areas as small as 4 sq m (43 sq ft2).

Honeybees also have a little-understood, built-in clock that appears to be synchronized with the store of nectar in flowers. Hence, honeybees making the rounds of flowers in search of nectar always seem to be at the right place at the right time.

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در جمعه یازدهم مرداد 1387  |

 

Honey Bee Fact Page

The honeybee, one of man's oldest insect friends, gives us honey, beeswax and most important of all, the fertilization of many of our cropbearing plants. The honeybee is a social insect living in large colonies of from 20,000 to 80,000 individuals. There are five species of honeybees known: Apis mellifera (common honeybee); Apis dorsata (giant honeybee); Apis laboriosa (giant honeybee); Apis cerana (Indian honeybee) and Apis florea (dwarf honeybee).

The common honeybee is found worldwide and consists of a number of races or subspecies. There are four subspecies of the common honeybee occurring in Europe, three oriental subspecies and 12 African subspecies. These races vary in their nature. Italian bees are generally gentle creatures, whereas German bees are agressive. However, it should be noted that even the normally gentle Italian bee, when provoked, will try to sting you. The weather often affects the temper of bees, and on windy, cloudy days, when they are unable to search for nectar, pollen, etc, they are somewhat angry or frustrated, and they may "take it out" on some innocent passerby.

One honeybee with a nasty disposition is the hybrid Brazilian honeybee. This hybrid resulted when African bees brought to Brazil in 1956 escaped and bred with native bees. The African bees were imported to improve production in the bee keeping industry. African bees are very industrious, foraging, or searching for food, earlier in the day and working longer in the evening. They also can work at higher or lower temperatures and thus produce more honey per year than the European species. However, they are very aggressive, sting with little provocation and chase their victims up to 328 feet. (Italian bees will normally only chase about 33 feet). Right now the Africanized bees are widespread in South Africa. They have become established in Mexico, and should already be established in Texas. A swarm of them were transported to Southern California in 1985, but they were destroyed. The effect of this bee on the United States beekeeping industry is uncertain. Also uncertain is how far north they will be able to survive.

The Castes. Three types of individuals, or castes, can at one time or another be found in a honeybee colony, including the queen (a fertile female), workers (infertile female) and drones (male). There is only one egg-laying queen in a hive. Most of the colony is made up of workers who build and repair the hive, search for nectar and pollen, produce wax and honey, feed the young and protect the hive against enemies. Worker bees are unmated females. The males have but one purpose in life and that is to mate with virgin queens. Once they have done this they die. Drones buzz ferociously, but lack a sting and are entirely harmless.

The Bee Sting. Most people who fear bees, do so because of their painful sting. When the bee stings, the stinger, poison sac and several others parts of the bee's anatomy are torn from the bee's body. It soon dies, a fact that offers little relief to the person who is stung. The action of the sting takes place almost instantaneously. The sting has barbs on it, and if it is not immediately removed, the reflex action of the muscles attached to the sting drive it deeper and deeper into the skin. This gives more time for the discharge of poison from the poison sac. The pain from the sting is increased by the discharge of toxin.

Different individuals are affected in different ways by bee stings. Some of the things that cause the differences are the part of the body that is stung, the amount of poison that has entered into the system and the natural immunity of the individual. The actual pain from the bee sting doesn't last long and it is the after effects - the swelling and itching - that are the most disturbing. Some individuals are naturally immune and do not swell, while others are so badly affected by bee sting they may be confined to bed for a number of days. In some instances, the sting of a bee may result in red blotches on the skin, nausea, fainting and even death! The stinger of a bee, as was previously mentioned, has barbs on it, and thus remains in the skin. At times, complications may result from the sting being embedded in the skin. For this reason, an effort should be made to remove the entire stinger.

The western honeybee, or hivebee, also builds its nest of many combs in sheltered places and is found in the United States, Europe, and Africa. Colonies kept in hives yield an average of 23 kg (50 pounds) of honey.

Unlike other bees, honeybees do not hibernate during cold weather. They last out the rigors of northern winters by feeding on stored supplies and sharing their body heat, clustering together in dense packs.

Socialization is most advanced in honeybees. As new, young queens are about to emerge in an established hive, half of the colony leaves with the old queen and clusters on a nearby bush or tree while scout bees search for a new home. When the scouts appear to agree on a new location, the swarm departs. At the old nest, meanwhile, the first queen to emerge disposes of the other queens (by stinging them) before they have a chance to emerge. Within a few days, the virgin queen will fly to where drones assemble, and mate with 6 to 12 drones. The sperm from these drones is stored in a sac (spermatheca) and used during her egg-laying life of from two to five years or a maximum of nine.

DRONES AND WORKERS

Drones develop by parthenogenesis from unfertilized eggs that the queen produces by withholding sperm from the eggs laid in large drone cells. Drones lack stings and the structures needed for pollen collection; in the autumn they are ejected by the colony to starve, unless the colony is queenless. New drones are produced in the spring for mating.

Both queens and workers are produced from fertilized eggs. Queen larvae are reared in special peanut-shaped cells and fed more of the pharyngeal gland secretions of the nurse bees (bee milk or royal jelly) than the worker larvae are. The precise mechanism for this caste differentiation is still uncertain. Although workers are similar in appearance and behavior to other female bees, they lack the structures for mating. When no queen is present to inhibit the development of their ovaries, however, workers eventually begin to lay eggs that develop into drones.

PHEROMONES

The integrity of the colony is maintained by chemical secretions, or PHEROMONES. Workers secrete pheromones from the so-called Nasanov gland at the tip of the abdomen when they cluster, enter a new nesting site, or mark a source of nectar or water. The colony scent is recognizable by bees of the same colony because of its unique combination of components derived from the colony's particular collections of nectar and pollen.

When queens fly to mate, a mandibular-gland pheromone attracts the drones. The same gland produces another pheromone, called queen substance, which workers lick from the queen's body and pass along as they exchange food with one another. The eaten pheromone inhibits the ovaries of workers; when the queen's secretion is inadequate, the colony produces queen cells to supersede her.

The mandibular, or mouth glands of workers produce an alarm odor, which serves to alert the colony when it is disturbed. Workers also produce a sting odor, which is released at the site of the sting and serves to direct other bees to the sting area. Stingless bees bite leaves at intervals along their flight path to provide a scent trail of mandibular secretions.

DANCE LANGUAGE

The ability of honeybees to communicate direction and distance from the hive to nectar sources through dance "language" has received widespread attention. In 1973, Karl von FRISCH received a Nobel Prize for deciphering the language, which consists of two basic dances: a dance in a circle, for indicating sources without reference to specific distance or direction; and a tail-wagging dance in which the exact distance is indicated by a number of straight runs with abdominal wagging--the fewer runs per minute, the farther away the source. Wing vibrations produce sounds at the same rate as the tail wagging and are detected by organs in the legs of other bees. Researchers have developed a robot "bee" that can communicate with other bees in this way.

The various species of Apis, and races of honeybees, indicate a particular distance by a different dance tempo. This may lead the individuals in colonies with a mixture of races to misunderstand messages about the distance to a feeding site. Stingless bees communicate only by sounds.

The direction, or azimuth, to the food source is indicated by the angle of the wagging dance to the Sun. That is, bees use the Sun as a compass, orienting the dance angle to the plane of polarization of the sunlight. Even when the Sun is obscured by clouds, bees can detect its position from the light in brighter patches of the sky. Ultraviolet designs in flowers serve as nectar guides to blooms in areas as small as 4 sq m (43 sq ft2).

Honeybees also have a little-understood, built-in clock that appears to be synchronized with the store of nectar in flowers. Hence, honeybees making the rounds of flowers in search of nectar always seem to be at the right place at the right time.

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در جمعه یازدهم مرداد 1387  |

 

Honey Bee Fact Page

The honeybee, one of man's oldest insect friends, gives us honey, beeswax and most important of all, the fertilization of many of our cropbearing plants. The honeybee is a social insect living in large colonies of from 20,000 to 80,000 individuals. There are five species of honeybees known: Apis mellifera (common honeybee); Apis dorsata (giant honeybee); Apis laboriosa (giant honeybee); Apis cerana (Indian honeybee) and Apis florea (dwarf honeybee).

The common honeybee is found worldwide and consists of a number of races or subspecies. There are four subspecies of the common honeybee occurring in Europe, three oriental subspecies and 12 African subspecies. These races vary in their nature. Italian bees are generally gentle creatures, whereas German bees are agressive. However, it should be noted that even the normally gentle Italian bee, when provoked, will try to sting you. The weather often affects the temper of bees, and on windy, cloudy days, when they are unable to search for nectar, pollen, etc, they are somewhat angry or frustrated, and they may "take it out" on some innocent passerby.

One honeybee with a nasty disposition is the hybrid Brazilian honeybee. This hybrid resulted when African bees brought to Brazil in 1956 escaped and bred with native bees. The African bees were imported to improve production in the bee keeping industry. African bees are very industrious, foraging, or searching for food, earlier in the day and working longer in the evening. They also can work at higher or lower temperatures and thus produce more honey per year than the European species. However, they are very aggressive, sting with little provocation and chase their victims up to 328 feet. (Italian bees will normally only chase about 33 feet). Right now the Africanized bees are widespread in South Africa. They have become established in Mexico, and should already be established in Texas. A swarm of them were transported to Southern California in 1985, but they were destroyed. The effect of this bee on the United States beekeeping industry is uncertain. Also uncertain is how far north they will be able to survive.

The Castes. Three types of individuals, or castes, can at one time or another be found in a honeybee colony, including the queen (a fertile female), workers (infertile female) and drones (male). There is only one egg-laying queen in a hive. Most of the colony is made up of workers who build and repair the hive, search for nectar and pollen, produce wax and honey, feed the young and protect the hive against enemies. Worker bees are unmated females. The males have but one purpose in life and that is to mate with virgin queens. Once they have done this they die. Drones buzz ferociously, but lack a sting and are entirely harmless.

The Bee Sting. Most people who fear bees, do so because of their painful sting. When the bee stings, the stinger, poison sac and several others parts of the bee's anatomy are torn from the bee's body. It soon dies, a fact that offers little relief to the person who is stung. The action of the sting takes place almost instantaneously. The sting has barbs on it, and if it is not immediately removed, the reflex action of the muscles attached to the sting drive it deeper and deeper into the skin. This gives more time for the discharge of poison from the poison sac. The pain from the sting is increased by the discharge of toxin.

Different individuals are affected in different ways by bee stings. Some of the things that cause the differences are the part of the body that is stung, the amount of poison that has entered into the system and the natural immunity of the individual. The actual pain from the bee sting doesn't last long and it is the after effects - the swelling and itching - that are the most disturbing. Some individuals are naturally immune and do not swell, while others are so badly affected by bee sting they may be confined to bed for a number of days. In some instances, the sting of a bee may result in red blotches on the skin, nausea, fainting and even death! The stinger of a bee, as was previously mentioned, has barbs on it, and thus remains in the skin. At times, complications may result from the sting being embedded in the skin. For this reason, an effort should be made to remove the entire stinger.

The western honeybee, or hivebee, also builds its nest of many combs in sheltered places and is found in the United States, Europe, and Africa. Colonies kept in hives yield an average of 23 kg (50 pounds) of honey.

Unlike other bees, honeybees do not hibernate during cold weather. They last out the rigors of northern winters by feeding on stored supplies and sharing their body heat, clustering together in dense packs.

Socialization is most advanced in honeybees. As new, young queens are about to emerge in an established hive, half of the colony leaves with the old queen and clusters on a nearby bush or tree while scout bees search for a new home. When the scouts appear to agree on a new location, the swarm departs. At the old nest, meanwhile, the first queen to emerge disposes of the other queens (by stinging them) before they have a chance to emerge. Within a few days, the virgin queen will fly to where drones assemble, and mate with 6 to 12 drones. The sperm from these drones is stored in a sac (spermatheca) and used during her egg-laying life of from two to five years or a maximum of nine.

DRONES AND WORKERS

Drones develop by parthenogenesis from unfertilized eggs that the queen produces by withholding sperm from the eggs laid in large drone cells. Drones lack stings and the structures needed for pollen collection; in the autumn they are ejected by the colony to starve, unless the colony is queenless. New drones are produced in the spring for mating.

Both queens and workers are produced from fertilized eggs. Queen larvae are reared in special peanut-shaped cells and fed more of the pharyngeal gland secretions of the nurse bees (bee milk or royal jelly) than the worker larvae are. The precise mechanism for this caste differentiation is still uncertain. Although workers are similar in appearance and behavior to other female bees, they lack the structures for mating. When no queen is present to inhibit the development of their ovaries, however, workers eventually begin to lay eggs that develop into drones.

PHEROMONES

The integrity of the colony is maintained by chemical secretions, or PHEROMONES. Workers secrete pheromones from the so-called Nasanov gland at the tip of the abdomen when they cluster, enter a new nesting site, or mark a source of nectar or water. The colony scent is recognizable by bees of the same colony because of its unique combination of components derived from the colony's particular collections of nectar and pollen.

When queens fly to mate, a mandibular-gland pheromone attracts the drones. The same gland produces another pheromone, called queen substance, which workers lick from the queen's body and pass along as they exchange food with one another. The eaten pheromone inhibits the ovaries of workers; when the queen's secretion is inadequate, the colony produces queen cells to supersede her.

The mandibular, or mouth glands of workers produce an alarm odor, which serves to alert the colony when it is disturbed. Workers also produce a sting odor, which is released at the site of the sting and serves to direct other bees to the sting area. Stingless bees bite leaves at intervals along their flight path to provide a scent trail of mandibular secretions.

DANCE LANGUAGE

The ability of honeybees to communicate direction and distance from the hive to nectar sources through dance "language" has received widespread attention. In 1973, Karl von FRISCH received a Nobel Prize for deciphering the language, which consists of two basic dances: a dance in a circle, for indicating sources without reference to specific distance or direction; and a tail-wagging dance in which the exact distance is indicated by a number of straight runs with abdominal wagging--the fewer runs per minute, the farther away the source. Wing vibrations produce sounds at the same rate as the tail wagging and are detected by organs in the legs of other bees. Researchers have developed a robot "bee" that can communicate with other bees in this way.

The various species of Apis, and races of honeybees, indicate a particular distance by a different dance tempo. This may lead the individuals in colonies with a mixture of races to misunderstand messages about the distance to a feeding site. Stingless bees communicate only by sounds.

The direction, or azimuth, to the food source is indicated by the angle of the wagging dance to the Sun. That is, bees use the Sun as a compass, orienting the dance angle to the plane of polarization of the sunlight. Even when the Sun is obscured by clouds, bees can detect its position from the light in brighter patches of the sky. Ultraviolet designs in flowers serve as nectar guides to blooms in areas as small as 4 sq m (43 sq ft2).

Honeybees also have a little-understood, built-in clock that appears to be synchronized with the store of nectar in flowers. Hence, honeybees making the rounds of flowers in search of nectar always seem to be at the right place at the right time.

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در جمعه یازدهم مرداد 1387  |

 

Honey Bee Fact Page

The honeybee, one of man's oldest insect friends, gives us honey, beeswax and most important of all, the fertilization of many of our cropbearing plants. The honeybee is a social insect living in large colonies of from 20,000 to 80,000 individuals. There are five species of honeybees known: Apis mellifera (common honeybee); Apis dorsata (giant honeybee); Apis laboriosa (giant honeybee); Apis cerana (Indian honeybee) and Apis florea (dwarf honeybee).

The common honeybee is found worldwide and consists of a number of races or subspecies. There are four subspecies of the common honeybee occurring in Europe, three oriental subspecies and 12 African subspecies. These races vary in their nature. Italian bees are generally gentle creatures, whereas German bees are agressive. However, it should be noted that even the normally gentle Italian bee, when provoked, will try to sting you. The weather often affects the temper of bees, and on windy, cloudy days, when they are unable to search for nectar, pollen, etc, they are somewhat angry or frustrated, and they may "take it out" on some innocent passerby.

One honeybee with a nasty disposition is the hybrid Brazilian honeybee. This hybrid resulted when African bees brought to Brazil in 1956 escaped and bred with native bees. The African bees were imported to improve production in the bee keeping industry. African bees are very industrious, foraging, or searching for food, earlier in the day and working longer in the evening. They also can work at higher or lower temperatures and thus produce more honey per year than the European species. However, they are very aggressive, sting with little provocation and chase their victims up to 328 feet. (Italian bees will normally only chase about 33 feet). Right now the Africanized bees are widespread in South Africa. They have become established in Mexico, and should already be established in Texas. A swarm of them were transported to Southern California in 1985, but they were destroyed. The effect of this bee on the United States beekeeping industry is uncertain. Also uncertain is how far north they will be able to survive.

The Castes. Three types of individuals, or castes, can at one time or another be found in a honeybee colony, including the queen (a fertile female), workers (infertile female) and drones (male). There is only one egg-laying queen in a hive. Most of the colony is made up of workers who build and repair the hive, search for nectar and pollen, produce wax and honey, feed the young and protect the hive against enemies. Worker bees are unmated females. The males have but one purpose in life and that is to mate with virgin queens. Once they have done this they die. Drones buzz ferociously, but lack a sting and are entirely harmless.

The Bee Sting. Most people who fear bees, do so because of their painful sting. When the bee stings, the stinger, poison sac and several others parts of the bee's anatomy are torn from the bee's body. It soon dies, a fact that offers little relief to the person who is stung. The action of the sting takes place almost instantaneously. The sting has barbs on it, and if it is not immediately removed, the reflex action of the muscles attached to the sting drive it deeper and deeper into the skin. This gives more time for the discharge of poison from the poison sac. The pain from the sting is increased by the discharge of toxin.

Different individuals are affected in different ways by bee stings. Some of the things that cause the differences are the part of the body that is stung, the amount of poison that has entered into the system and the natural immunity of the individual. The actual pain from the bee sting doesn't last long and it is the after effects - the swelling and itching - that are the most disturbing. Some individuals are naturally immune and do not swell, while others are so badly affected by bee sting they may be confined to bed for a number of days. In some instances, the sting of a bee may result in red blotches on the skin, nausea, fainting and even death! The stinger of a bee, as was previously mentioned, has barbs on it, and thus remains in the skin. At times, complications may result from the sting being embedded in the skin. For this reason, an effort should be made to remove the entire stinger.

The western honeybee, or hivebee, also builds its nest of many combs in sheltered places and is found in the United States, Europe, and Africa. Colonies kept in hives yield an average of 23 kg (50 pounds) of honey.

Unlike other bees, honeybees do not hibernate during cold weather. They last out the rigors of northern winters by feeding on stored supplies and sharing their body heat, clustering together in dense packs.

Socialization is most advanced in honeybees. As new, young queens are about to emerge in an established hive, half of the colony leaves with the old queen and clusters on a nearby bush or tree while scout bees search for a new home. When the scouts appear to agree on a new location, the swarm departs. At the old nest, meanwhile, the first queen to emerge disposes of the other queens (by stinging them) before they have a chance to emerge. Within a few days, the virgin queen will fly to where drones assemble, and mate with 6 to 12 drones. The sperm from these drones is stored in a sac (spermatheca) and used during her egg-laying life of from two to five years or a maximum of nine.

DRONES AND WORKERS

Drones develop by parthenogenesis from unfertilized eggs that the queen produces by withholding sperm from the eggs laid in large drone cells. Drones lack stings and the structures needed for pollen collection; in the autumn they are ejected by the colony to starve, unless the colony is queenless. New drones are produced in the spring for mating.

Both queens and workers are produced from fertilized eggs. Queen larvae are reared in special peanut-shaped cells and fed more of the pharyngeal gland secretions of the nurse bees (bee milk or royal jelly) than the worker larvae are. The precise mechanism for this caste differentiation is still uncertain. Although workers are similar in appearance and behavior to other female bees, they lack the structures for mating. When no queen is present to inhibit the development of their ovaries, however, workers eventually begin to lay eggs that develop into drones.

PHEROMONES

The integrity of the colony is maintained by chemical secretions, or PHEROMONES. Workers secrete pheromones from the so-called Nasanov gland at the tip of the abdomen when they cluster, enter a new nesting site, or mark a source of nectar or water. The colony scent is recognizable by bees of the same colony because of its unique combination of components derived from the colony's particular collections of nectar and pollen.

When queens fly to mate, a mandibular-gland pheromone attracts the drones. The same gland produces another pheromone, called queen substance, which workers lick from the queen's body and pass along as they exchange food with one another. The eaten pheromone inhibits the ovaries of workers; when the queen's secretion is inadequate, the colony produces queen cells to supersede her.

The mandibular, or mouth glands of workers produce an alarm odor, which serves to alert the colony when it is disturbed. Workers also produce a sting odor, which is released at the site of the sting and serves to direct other bees to the sting area. Stingless bees bite leaves at intervals along their flight path to provide a scent trail of mandibular secretions.

DANCE LANGUAGE

The ability of honeybees to communicate direction and distance from the hive to nectar sources through dance "language" has received widespread attention. In 1973, Karl von FRISCH received a Nobel Prize for deciphering the language, which consists of two basic dances: a dance in a circle, for indicating sources without reference to specific distance or direction; and a tail-wagging dance in which the exact distance is indicated by a number of straight runs with abdominal wagging--the fewer runs per minute, the farther away the source. Wing vibrations produce sounds at the same rate as the tail wagging and are detected by organs in the legs of other bees. Researchers have developed a robot "bee" that can communicate with other bees in this way.

The various species of Apis, and races of honeybees, indicate a particular distance by a different dance tempo. This may lead the individuals in colonies with a mixture of races to misunderstand messages about the distance to a feeding site. Stingless bees communicate only by sounds.

The direction, or azimuth, to the food source is indicated by the angle of the wagging dance to the Sun. That is, bees use the Sun as a compass, orienting the dance angle to the plane of polarization of the sunlight. Even when the Sun is obscured by clouds, bees can detect its position from the light in brighter patches of the sky. Ultraviolet designs in flowers serve as nectar guides to blooms in areas as small as 4 sq m (43 sq ft2).

Honeybees also have a little-understood, built-in clock that appears to be synchronized with the store of nectar in flowers. Hence, honeybees making the rounds of flowers in search of nectar always seem to be at the right place at the right time.

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در جمعه یازدهم مرداد 1387  |

 

Honey Bee Fact Page

The honeybee, one of man's oldest insect friends, gives us honey, beeswax and most important of all, the fertilization of many of our cropbearing plants. The honeybee is a social insect living in large colonies of from 20,000 to 80,000 individuals. There are five species of honeybees known: Apis mellifera (common honeybee); Apis dorsata (giant honeybee); Apis laboriosa (giant honeybee); Apis cerana (Indian honeybee) and Apis florea (dwarf honeybee).

The common honeybee is found worldwide and consists of a number of races or subspecies. There are four subspecies of the common honeybee occurring in Europe, three oriental subspecies and 12 African subspecies. These races vary in their nature. Italian bees are generally gentle creatures, whereas German bees are agressive. However, it should be noted that even the normally gentle Italian bee, when provoked, will try to sting you. The weather often affects the temper of bees, and on windy, cloudy days, when they are unable to search for nectar, pollen, etc, they are somewhat angry or frustrated, and they may "take it out" on some innocent passerby.

One honeybee with a nasty disposition is the hybrid Brazilian honeybee. This hybrid resulted when African bees brought to Brazil in 1956 escaped and bred with native bees. The African bees were imported to improve production in the bee keeping industry. African bees are very industrious, foraging, or searching for food, earlier in the day and working longer in the evening. They also can work at higher or lower temperatures and thus produce more honey per year than the European species. However, they are very aggressive, sting with little provocation and chase their victims up to 328 feet. (Italian bees will normally only chase about 33 feet). Right now the Africanized bees are widespread in South Africa. They have become established in Mexico, and should already be established in Texas. A swarm of them were transported to Southern California in 1985, but they were destroyed. The effect of this bee on the United States beekeeping industry is uncertain. Also uncertain is how far north they will be able to survive.

The Castes. Three types of individuals, or castes, can at one time or another be found in a honeybee colony, including the queen (a fertile female), workers (infertile female) and drones (male). There is only one egg-laying queen in a hive. Most of the colony is made up of workers who build and repair the hive, search for nectar and pollen, produce wax and honey, feed the young and protect the hive against enemies. Worker bees are unmated females. The males have but one purpose in life and that is to mate with virgin queens. Once they have done this they die. Drones buzz ferociously, but lack a sting and are entirely harmless.

The Bee Sting. Most people who fear bees, do so because of their painful sting. When the bee stings, the stinger, poison sac and several others parts of the bee's anatomy are torn from the bee's body. It soon dies, a fact that offers little relief to the person who is stung. The action of the sting takes place almost instantaneously. The sting has barbs on it, and if it is not immediately removed, the reflex action of the muscles attached to the sting drive it deeper and deeper into the skin. This gives more time for the discharge of poison from the poison sac. The pain from the sting is increased by the discharge of toxin.

Different individuals are affected in different ways by bee stings. Some of the things that cause the differences are the part of the body that is stung, the amount of poison that has entered into the system and the natural immunity of the individual. The actual pain from the bee sting doesn't last long and it is the after effects - the swelling and itching - that are the most disturbing. Some individuals are naturally immune and do not swell, while others are so badly affected by bee sting they may be confined to bed for a number of days. In some instances, the sting of a bee may result in red blotches on the skin, nausea, fainting and even death! The stinger of a bee, as was previously mentioned, has barbs on it, and thus remains in the skin. At times, complications may result from the sting being embedded in the skin. For this reason, an effort should be made to remove the entire stinger.

The western honeybee, or hivebee, also builds its nest of many combs in sheltered places and is found in the United States, Europe, and Africa. Colonies kept in hives yield an average of 23 kg (50 pounds) of honey.

Unlike other bees, honeybees do not hibernate during cold weather. They last out the rigors of northern winters by feeding on stored supplies and sharing their body heat, clustering together in dense packs.

Socialization is most advanced in honeybees. As new, young queens are about to emerge in an established hive, half of the colony leaves with the old queen and clusters on a nearby bush or tree while scout bees search for a new home. When the scouts appear to agree on a new location, the swarm departs. At the old nest, meanwhile, the first queen to emerge disposes of the other queens (by stinging them) before they have a chance to emerge. Within a few days, the virgin queen will fly to where drones assemble, and mate with 6 to 12 drones. The sperm from these drones is stored in a sac (spermatheca) and used during her egg-laying life of from two to five years or a maximum of nine.

DRONES AND WORKERS

Drones develop by parthenogenesis from unfertilized eggs that the queen produces by withholding sperm from the eggs laid in large drone cells. Drones lack stings and the structures needed for pollen collection; in the autumn they are ejected by the colony to starve, unless the colony is queenless. New drones are produced in the spring for mating.

Both queens and workers are produced from fertilized eggs. Queen larvae are reared in special peanut-shaped cells and fed more of the pharyngeal gland secretions of the nurse bees (bee milk or royal jelly) than the worker larvae are. The precise mechanism for this caste differentiation is still uncertain. Although workers are similar in appearance and behavior to other female bees, they lack the structures for mating. When no queen is present to inhibit the development of their ovaries, however, workers eventually begin to lay eggs that develop into drones.

PHEROMONES

The integrity of the colony is maintained by chemical secretions, or PHEROMONES. Workers secrete pheromones from the so-called Nasanov gland at the tip of the abdomen when they cluster, enter a new nesting site, or mark a source of nectar or water. The colony scent is recognizable by bees of the same colony because of its unique combination of components derived from the colony's particular collections of nectar and pollen.

When queens fly to mate, a mandibular-gland pheromone attracts the drones. The same gland produces another pheromone, called queen substance, which workers lick from the queen's body and pass along as they exchange food with one another. The eaten pheromone inhibits the ovaries of workers; when the queen's secretion is inadequate, the colony produces queen cells to supersede her.

The mandibular, or mouth glands of workers produce an alarm odor, which serves to alert the colony when it is disturbed. Workers also produce a sting odor, which is released at the site of the sting and serves to direct other bees to the sting area. Stingless bees bite leaves at intervals along their flight path to provide a scent trail of mandibular secretions.

DANCE LANGUAGE

The ability of honeybees to communicate direction and distance from the hive to nectar sources through dance "language" has received widespread attention. In 1973, Karl von FRISCH received a Nobel Prize for deciphering the language, which consists of two basic dances: a dance in a circle, for indicating sources without reference to specific distance or direction; and a tail-wagging dance in which the exact distance is indicated by a number of straight runs with abdominal wagging--the fewer runs per minute, the farther away the source. Wing vibrations produce sounds at the same rate as the tail wagging and are detected by organs in the legs of other bees. Researchers have developed a robot "bee" that can communicate with other bees in this way.

The various species of Apis, and races of honeybees, indicate a particular distance by a different dance tempo. This may lead the individuals in colonies with a mixture of races to misunderstand messages about the distance to a feeding site. Stingless bees communicate only by sounds.

The direction, or azimuth, to the food source is indicated by the angle of the wagging dance to the Sun. That is, bees use the Sun as a compass, orienting the dance angle to the plane of polarization of the sunlight. Even when the Sun is obscured by clouds, bees can detect its position from the light in brighter patches of the sky. Ultraviolet designs in flowers serve as nectar guides to blooms in areas as small as 4 sq m (43 sq ft2).

Honeybees also have a little-understood, built-in clock that appears to be synchronized with the store of nectar in flowers. Hence, honeybees making the rounds of flowers in search of nectar always seem to be at the right place at the right time.

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در جمعه یازدهم مرداد 1387  |

 

Honey Bee Fact Page

The honeybee, one of man's oldest insect friends, gives us honey, beeswax and most important of all, the fertilization of many of our cropbearing plants. The honeybee is a social insect living in large colonies of from 20,000 to 80,000 individuals. There are five species of honeybees known: Apis mellifera (common honeybee); Apis dorsata (giant honeybee); Apis laboriosa (giant honeybee); Apis cerana (Indian honeybee) and Apis florea (dwarf honeybee).

The common honeybee is found worldwide and consists of a number of races or subspecies. There are four subspecies of the common honeybee occurring in Europe, three oriental subspecies and 12 African subspecies. These races vary in their nature. Italian bees are generally gentle creatures, whereas German bees are agressive. However, it should be noted that even the normally gentle Italian bee, when provoked, will try to sting you. The weather often affects the temper of bees, and on windy, cloudy days, when they are unable to search for nectar, pollen, etc, they are somewhat angry or frustrated, and they may "take it out" on some innocent passerby.

One honeybee with a nasty disposition is the hybrid Brazilian honeybee. This hybrid resulted when African bees brought to Brazil in 1956 escaped and bred with native bees. The African bees were imported to improve production in the bee keeping industry. African bees are very industrious, foraging, or searching for food, earlier in the day and working longer in the evening. They also can work at higher or lower temperatures and thus produce more honey per year than the European species. However, they are very aggressive, sting with little provocation and chase their victims up to 328 feet. (Italian bees will normally only chase about 33 feet). Right now the Africanized bees are widespread in South Africa. They have become established in Mexico, and should already be established in Texas. A swarm of them were transported to Southern California in 1985, but they were destroyed. The effect of this bee on the United States beekeeping industry is uncertain. Also uncertain is how far north they will be able to survive.

The Castes. Three types of individuals, or castes, can at one time or another be found in a honeybee colony, including the queen (a fertile female), workers (infertile female) and drones (male). There is only one egg-laying queen in a hive. Most of the colony is made up of workers who build and repair the hive, search for nectar and pollen, produce wax and honey, feed the young and protect the hive against enemies. Worker bees are unmated females. The males have but one purpose in life and that is to mate with virgin queens. Once they have done this they die. Drones buzz ferociously, but lack a sting and are entirely harmless.

The Bee Sting. Most people who fear bees, do so because of their painful sting. When the bee stings, the stinger, poison sac and several others parts of the bee's anatomy are torn from the bee's body. It soon dies, a fact that offers little relief to the person who is stung. The action of the sting takes place almost instantaneously. The sting has barbs on it, and if it is not immediately removed, the reflex action of the muscles attached to the sting drive it deeper and deeper into the skin. This gives more time for the discharge of poison from the poison sac. The pain from the sting is increased by the discharge of toxin.

Different individuals are affected in different ways by bee stings. Some of the things that cause the differences are the part of the body that is stung, the amount of poison that has entered into the system and the natural immunity of the individual. The actual pain from the bee sting doesn't last long and it is the after effects - the swelling and itching - that are the most disturbing. Some individuals are naturally immune and do not swell, while others are so badly affected by bee sting they may be confined to bed for a number of days. In some instances, the sting of a bee may result in red blotches on the skin, nausea, fainting and even death! The stinger of a bee, as was previously mentioned, has barbs on it, and thus remains in the skin. At times, complications may result from the sting being embedded in the skin. For this reason, an effort should be made to remove the entire stinger.

The western honeybee, or hivebee, also builds its nest of many combs in sheltered places and is found in the United States, Europe, and Africa. Colonies kept in hives yield an average of 23 kg (50 pounds) of honey.

Unlike other bees, honeybees do not hibernate during cold weather. They last out the rigors of northern winters by feeding on stored supplies and sharing their body heat, clustering together in dense packs.

Socialization is most advanced in honeybees. As new, young queens are about to emerge in an established hive, half of the colony leaves with the old queen and clusters on a nearby bush or tree while scout bees search for a new home. When the scouts appear to agree on a new location, the swarm departs. At the old nest, meanwhile, the first queen to emerge disposes of the other queens (by stinging them) before they have a chance to emerge. Within a few days, the virgin queen will fly to where drones assemble, and mate with 6 to 12 drones. The sperm from these drones is stored in a sac (spermatheca) and used during her egg-laying life of from two to five years or a maximum of nine.

DRONES AND WORKERS

Drones develop by parthenogenesis from unfertilized eggs that the queen produces by withholding sperm from the eggs laid in large drone cells. Drones lack stings and the structures needed for pollen collection; in the autumn they are ejected by the colony to starve, unless the colony is queenless. New drones are produced in the spring for mating.

Both queens and workers are produced from fertilized eggs. Queen larvae are reared in special peanut-shaped cells and fed more of the pharyngeal gland secretions of the nurse bees (bee milk or royal jelly) than the worker larvae are. The precise mechanism for this caste differentiation is still uncertain. Although workers are similar in appearance and behavior to other female bees, they lack the structures for mating. When no queen is present to inhibit the development of their ovaries, however, workers eventually begin to lay eggs that develop into drones.

PHEROMONES

The integrity of the colony is maintained by chemical secretions, or PHEROMONES. Workers secrete pheromones from the so-called Nasanov gland at the tip of the abdomen when they cluster, enter a new nesting site, or mark a source of nectar or water. The colony scent is recognizable by bees of the same colony because of its unique combination of components derived from the colony's particular collections of nectar and pollen.

When queens fly to mate, a mandibular-gland pheromone attracts the drones. The same gland produces another pheromone, called queen substance, which workers lick from the queen's body and pass along as they exchange food with one another. The eaten pheromone inhibits the ovaries of workers; when the queen's secretion is inadequate, the colony produces queen cells to supersede her.

The mandibular, or mouth glands of workers produce an alarm odor, which serves to alert the colony when it is disturbed. Workers also produce a sting odor, which is released at the site of the sting and serves to direct other bees to the sting area. Stingless bees bite leaves at intervals along their flight path to provide a scent trail of mandibular secretions.

DANCE LANGUAGE

The ability of honeybees to communicate direction and distance from the hive to nectar sources through dance "language" has received widespread attention. In 1973, Karl von FRISCH received a Nobel Prize for deciphering the language, which consists of two basic dances: a dance in a circle, for indicating sources without reference to specific distance or direction; and a tail-wagging dance in which the exact distance is indicated by a number of straight runs with abdominal wagging--the fewer runs per minute, the farther away the source. Wing vibrations produce sounds at the same rate as the tail wagging and are detected by organs in the legs of other bees. Researchers have developed a robot "bee" that can communicate with other bees in this way.

The various species of Apis, and races of honeybees, indicate a particular distance by a different dance tempo. This may lead the individuals in colonies with a mixture of races to misunderstand messages about the distance to a feeding site. Stingless bees communicate only by sounds.

The direction, or azimuth, to the food source is indicated by the angle of the wagging dance to the Sun. That is, bees use the Sun as a compass, orienting the dance angle to the plane of polarization of the sunlight. Even when the Sun is obscured by clouds, bees can detect its position from the light in brighter patches of the sky. Ultraviolet designs in flowers serve as nectar guides to blooms in areas as small as 4 sq m (43 sq ft2).

Honeybees also have a little-understood, built-in clock that appears to be synchronized with the store of nectar in flowers. Hence, honeybees making the rounds of flowers in search of nectar always seem to be at the right place at the right time.

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در جمعه یازدهم مرداد 1387  |

 

bee may be a cliche. But it turns out that bees are very busy on the world's farms, pollinating many of the fruits, vegetables and nuts we eat.

But a major report from the National Academies says bees and other important pollinators are losing out to development and disease. The report's authors warn the losses could have a big impact on some farmers, such as the almond growers of Central California.

Growers there depend on commercial beekeepers to produce their billion-pound nut crop, which is among the state's most valuable agricultural product.

A Beekeeper's Best Friend

Beekeeper Gene Brandi stores some of colonies in large white boxes not far from a sprawling almond orchard near Los Banos.

Last spring, his bees spread pollen from tree to tree in the orchard. Now, giant harvesting machines are moving through the orchard, shaking trees with a crab-like craw and making the nuts spill down to the ground.

Recently, Brandi was getting his hives ready for the winter. He wore a big round hat with mesh that kept the honeybees off his face. To keep the bees calm, he shot puffs of dark gray smoke into the hives, after dropping matches into a beat-up metal box called a smoker. "The smoker is the beekeeper's best friend, other than the bees themselves," he said.

A Farmer's Best Friend

Brandi's been a beekeeper since 1978. In that time, his bees have pollinated not just almond trees, but cranberries, blueberries, cherries, apples, plums, melons, avocados and wide variety of vegetables. According to the new report, beekeepers like Brandi help put the bloom on at least 90 important crops -- including about one-third of the fruit, vegetables and nuts found in your local store.

Indeed, many beekeepers ship their bees around the country so that they can be in the right place at the right time for the farmers.

Brandi says it takes a lot of healthy honeybees to do this massive job -- like the ones in his colonies.

"Big full bodies, full wings," he says, admiring his bees. "They are gathering nectar, gathering pollen, and that indicates colony health to me. These are basically happy contented bees."

But keeping bees healthy isn't easy, he says. You have to watch out for everything from freakish weather to predators like bears and skunks. Brandi says the skunks come in at night and scratch at the front of the wooden hives.

"And they get the bees to come out, and they will fill their bellies with bees," Brandi says. "They don't want honey they just want bees," he says.

The Varroa Vampire Mite

But Brandi says bears and skunks are nothing compared to a newer threat. It's a tiny Asian mite that sucks the juices out of European honeybees, crippling and then wiping out entire colonies.

 

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در جمعه یازدهم مرداد 1387  |

 

Honey Bee Fact Page

The honeybee, one of man's oldest insect friends, gives us honey, beeswax and most important of all, the fertilization of many of our cropbearing plants. The honeybee is a social insect living in large colonies of from 20,000 to 80,000 individuals. There are five species of honeybees known: Apis mellifera (common honeybee); Apis dorsata (giant honeybee); Apis laboriosa (giant honeybee); Apis cerana (Indian honeybee) and Apis florea (dwarf honeybee).

The common honeybee is found worldwide and consists of a number of races or subspecies. There are four subspecies of the common honeybee occurring in Europe, three oriental subspecies and 12 African subspecies. These races vary in their nature. Italian bees are generally gentle creatures, whereas German bees are agressive. However, it should be noted that even the normally gentle Italian bee, when provoked, will try to sting you. The weather often affects the temper of bees, and on windy, cloudy days, when they are unable to search for nectar, pollen, etc, they are somewhat angry or frustrated, and they may "take it out" on some innocent passerby.

One honeybee with a nasty disposition is the hybrid Brazilian honeybee. This hybrid resulted when African bees brought to Brazil in 1956 escaped and bred with native bees. The African bees were imported to improve production in the bee keeping industry. African bees are very industrious, foraging, or searching for food, earlier in the day and working longer in the evening. They also can work at higher or lower temperatures and thus produce more honey per year than the European species. However, they are very aggressive, sting with little provocation and chase their victims up to 328 feet. (Italian bees will normally only chase about 33 feet). Right now the Africanized bees are widespread in South Africa. They have become established in Mexico, and should already be established in Texas. A swarm of them were transported to Southern California in 1985, but they were destroyed. The effect of this bee on the United States beekeeping industry is uncertain. Also uncertain is how far north they will be able to survive.

The Castes. Three types of individuals, or castes, can at one time or another be found in a honeybee colony, including the queen (a fertile female), workers (infertile female) and drones (male). There is only one egg-laying queen in a hive. Most of the colony is made up of workers who build and repair the hive, search for nectar and pollen, produce wax and honey, feed the young and protect the hive against enemies. Worker bees are unmated females. The males have but one purpose in life and that is to mate with virgin queens. Once they have done this they die. Drones buzz ferociously, but lack a sting and are entirely harmless.

The Bee Sting. Most people who fear bees, do so because of their painful sting. When the bee stings, the stinger, poison sac and several others parts of the bee's anatomy are torn from the bee's body. It soon dies, a fact that offers little relief to the person who is stung. The action of the sting takes place almost instantaneously. The sting has barbs on it, and if it is not immediately removed, the reflex action of the muscles attached to the sting drive it deeper and deeper into the skin. This gives more time for the discharge of poison from the poison sac. The pain from the sting is increased by the discharge of toxin.

Different individuals are affected in different ways by bee stings. Some of the things that cause the differences are the part of the body that is stung, the amount of poison that has entered into the system and the natural immunity of the individual. The actual pain from the bee sting doesn't last long and it is the after effects - the swelling and itching - that are the most disturbing. Some individuals are naturally immune and do not swell, while others are so badly affected by bee sting they may be confined to bed for a number of days. In some instances, the sting of a bee may result in red blotches on the skin, nausea, fainting and even death! The stinger of a bee, as was previously mentioned, has barbs on it, and thus remains in the skin. At times, complications may result from the sting being embedded in the skin. For this reason, an effort should be made to remove the entire stinger.

The western honeybee, or hivebee, also builds its nest of many combs in sheltered places and is found in the United States, Europe, and Africa. Colonies kept in hives yield an average of 23 kg (50 pounds) of honey.

Unlike other bees, honeybees do not hibernate during cold weather. They last out the rigors of northern winters by feeding on stored supplies and sharing their body heat, clustering together in dense packs.

Socialization is most advanced in honeybees. As new, young queens are about to emerge in an established hive, half of the colony leaves with the old queen and clusters on a nearby bush or tree while scout bees search for a new home. When the scouts appear to agree on a new location, the swarm departs. At the old nest, meanwhile, the first queen to emerge disposes of the other queens (by stinging them) before they have a chance to emerge. Within a few days, the virgin queen will fly to where drones assemble, and mate with 6 to 12 drones. The sperm from these drones is stored in a sac (spermatheca) and used during her egg-laying life of from two to five years or a maximum of nine.

DRONES AND WORKERS

Drones develop by parthenogenesis from unfertilized eggs that the queen produces by withholding sperm from the eggs laid in large drone cells. Drones lack stings and the structures needed for pollen collection; in the autumn they are ejected by the colony to starve, unless the colony is queenless. New drones are produced in the spring for mating.

Both queens and workers are produced from fertilized eggs. Queen larvae are reared in special peanut-shaped cells and fed more of the pharyngeal gland secretions of the nurse bees (bee milk or royal jelly) than the worker larvae are. The precise mechanism for this caste differentiation is still uncertain. Although workers are similar in appearance and behavior to other female bees, they lack the structures for mating. When no queen is present to inhibit the development of their ovaries, however, workers eventually begin to lay eggs that develop into drones.

PHEROMONES

The integrity of the colony is maintained by chemical secretions, or PHEROMONES. Workers secrete pheromones from the so-called Nasanov gland at the tip of the abdomen when they cluster, enter a new nesting site, or mark a source of nectar or water. The colony scent is recognizable by bees of the same colony because of its unique combination of components derived from the colony's particular collections of nectar and pollen.

When queens fly to mate, a mandibular-gland pheromone attracts the drones. The same gland produces another pheromone, called queen substance, which workers lick from the queen's body and pass along as they exchange food with one another. The eaten pheromone inhibits the ovaries of workers; when the queen's secretion is inadequate, the colony produces queen cells to supersede her.

The mandibular, or mouth glands of workers produce an alarm odor, which serves to alert the colony when it is disturbed. Workers also produce a sting odor, which is released at the site of the sting and serves to direct other bees to the sting area. Stingless bees bite leaves at intervals along their flight path to provide a scent trail of mandibular secretions.

DANCE LANGUAGE

The ability of honeybees to communicate direction and distance from the hive to nectar sources through dance "language" has received widespread attention. In 1973, Karl von FRISCH received a Nobel Prize for deciphering the language, which consists of two basic dances: a dance in a circle, for indicating sources without reference to specific distance or direction; and a tail-wagging dance in which the exact distance is indicated by a number of straight runs with abdominal wagging--the fewer runs per minute, the farther away the source. Wing vibrations produce sounds at the same rate as the tail wagging and are detected by organs in the legs of other bees. Researchers have developed a robot "bee" that can communicate with other bees in this way.

The various species of Apis, and races of honeybees, indicate a particular distance by a different dance tempo. This may lead the individuals in colonies with a mixture of races to misunderstand messages about the distance to a feeding site. Stingless bees communicate only by sounds.

The direction, or azimuth, to the food source is indicated by the angle of the wagging dance to the Sun. That is, bees use the Sun as a compass, orienting the dance angle to the plane of polarization of the sunlight. Even when the Sun is obscured by clouds, bees can detect its position from the light in brighter patches of the sky. Ultraviolet designs in flowers serve as nectar guides to blooms in areas as small as 4 sq m (43 sq ft2).

Honeybees also have a little-understood, built-in clock that appears to be synchronized with the store of nectar in flowers. Hence, honeybees making the rounds of flowers in search of nectar always seem to be at the right place at the right time.

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در جمعه یازدهم مرداد 1387  |

 

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در پنجشنبه بیستم تیر 1387  |

 شعری زیبا از رابرت فراست شاعر معروف

THE RAIN TO THE WIND SAID:YOU PUSH AND ILL PELT

THEY SO SMOTE THE GARDEN BED

THAT THE FLOWERS ACTUALLY KNELT

AND LAY LODGED-THOUGH NOT DEAD

I KNOW HOW  THE FLOWERS FELT.

ROBERT FROST  

 

|+| نوشته شده توسط Dr.shu در دوشنبه هفدهم تیر 1387  |