What is the job of worker bees?

Honey bees are typical social insects. Generally, a bee colony consists of a queen bee, hundreds to thousands of drones, and tens of thousands or even tens of thousands of worker bees. The three types of bees cannot reproduce normally without any one of the bee colonies. You can't survive alone without a group. Let's take a look at what the responsibilities of worker bees are!

Worker bee definition

Worker bees are the largest group in the bee colony, ranging from thousands to tens of thousands, and as many as tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands. Like the queen bee, worker bees are also female bees developed from fertilized eggs. Only the reproductive organs of worker bees develop Incomplete, unable to mate with drones. If the bee colony does not have a queen bee for a long time, some worker bees can also lay eggs, but worker bees can only produce unfertilized drones that can only develop into small-sized drones at most.

Worker Bee Responsibilities Discussion

Worker bees are the most important workers in the bee colony. They are mainly responsible for collecting food, building the hive, brewing honey, feeding larvae, guarding the hive, and almost all the work inside and outside the bee colony. In order to improve the work efficiency, the morphological structure of the worker bees also shows many specializations. Phenomena, such as the specialization of appendages to form pollen brushes and pollen combs, the specialization of reproductive organs into stingers connected with poison, and the specialization of wax glands that secrete beeswax in the abdomen.

Worker bee development process

The worker bees complete their development in the worker hive. The egg stage is about 3 days, the larval stage is about 6 days, and the pupa stage is about 11 days (the Italian bee pupa stage is about 12 days). It takes a total of 20 days from egg to bee. After eating royal jelly, you can only eat ordinary pollen and nectar. If worker bees have been eating royal jelly from the larval stage, they can also develop into queen bees.

Classification of worker bees

1. Nursing bees: Nursing bees are worker bees within 10 days after eclosion. They are mainly responsible for working in the nest, including heat preservation and heat dissipation, cleaning the nest room, preparing honey powder, and feeding larvae.

2. Nest-builder bees: Nest-builder bees are worker bees that have emerged for 10 to 20 days. They are mainly responsible for working in the nest, including building the nest, brewing honey, compacting pollen, guarding the beehive, etc.

3. Gathering bees: Gathering bees are worker bees that have emerged for more than 20 days. They are mainly responsible for working outside the nest, including collecting pollen and nectar, finding honey sources, and collecting water from water sources.