THE HONEY BEE

How is this for co-operative design? 

Honey bees equipped to help themselves to pollen from flowers, cross-pollinate crops in the process and help to keep the world in food. For their tireless efforts they score a bonus called nectar, conveniently offered by flower tissues called nectaries.

What’s in it for us? Most of the nectar as honey.

Meet  the amazing female worker bee:
·        5 eyes that are colour sensitive (except red) and ultra-violet sensitive
·        2 pairs of wings with the front and rear wings hooking together in flight (How neat is that!)
·        Front legs with feathery hair for collecting pollen - and a special slot for antenna cleaning!
·        Middle legs with stiff hairs for grooming - brushing pollen off the thorax (chest)
·        Rear legs with pollen baskets for storing pollen, assisted by long curved hairs
·        Wax glands under the abdomen for cell making

What else is in a bee-hive besides honey?

·         The main-player: the Queen, who may lay 1,000,000 eggs in her 5 year life but then be replaced if she swarms to a new colony or dies. The first virgin queen to emerge from her cell kills the other virgin queens then launches into her maiden flight, followed by the hopeful male drones. Only one will succeed in mating with and fertilizing her, only to die for his trouble.  That’s enough for her, thanks very much - she will never mate again.
·        The honeycomb wall of hexagonal cells – is there any other more efficient storage design?
·        royal jelly secreted by young workers for hatching lavae to feed on
·        nectar stored in the worker's 'honey stomach'
·        pollen with honey, for making beebread fed to larvae
·        wax secreted by female workers for cell making
·        propolis or bee glue from certain trees, used for repairing cracks
·        water sprinkled for evaporative cooling

The brief life of the female worker bee:

The 1st 3 days         Cleaning the nest                ("Tidy up your room!")

then 2 days  Feeding the older larvae    (Looking after the younger children)

then 6 days  Feeding royal jelly to the Queen and her young larvae  
(waiting on Mum with her new baby)                                                                  

then 4 days  Building cells with wax      (Helping to keep house)

then 5 days  Receiving nectar & pollen            (Cooking in the kitchen)

after 3 weeks          Sentry duty with warning scent
(Answer the front door bell)

last few weeks        Collect nectar & pollen                 (Go shopping for Mum)

If that's not enough to keep you occupied my dear, you can feed the boys, or join the shiver team warming the place up, or fan the hive to keep it cool, and fetch water for the evaporative cooling.   Now isn't that a training program! 

By the way, the Jews called the bee: deborah, not because of its buzz, or its honey, or its sting, but because of its 'systemic instincts' or orderliness. Not only has Deborah learnt to keep house and tend to babies, she spends time each day patrolling the hive to see if there’s anything that needs doing, and she can dance as well! When she finds plenty of nectar, or a suitable location for a new colony, she returns to the hive and tells the others by performing an elaborate round dance or a 'waggle’ figure of eight dance on the honeycomb wall – in the dark.  The more excited the dance the closer the site is and the angle of the dance indicates the angle relative to the sun.  Wow!

That's got to be one brilliant design by a very clever Creator.

What about the boys (drones)?                                                                                               
They have only three interests in life - food, travel & hoping for sex with any queen.  They can't even sting and when times get tough, it's out the door for them.

 

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
Karl von Frisch (1886-1982), zoologist.
Bill & Penny McKinnon, beekeepers, Sancrox via Port Macquarie, NSW                                           
Photocredits: Bee & flower / Tony Sullivan Bee dance /creationtips.com                                                                                                                         
Bee anatomy / Barbara Lindburgh at bee-magic.blogspot.com