Watching A Queen Honey Bee

The long bee with a shiny circle on its back in this video is a queen honey bee. Let’s get to know a little more about the queen bee!

A Bit About The Queen

There is typically only one queen bee in a bee colony, and a colony cannot survive without its queen. She will never leave her hive unless to mate or swarm, she can live up to 5 years, and her sole job is to lay eggs. A mated queen will lay about 1,000-1,500 eggs in one day!

The Queen's Posse

It is a retune of worker bees that tend to the queen around the clock. This special and dedicated group of young worker bees will address her every single need so she can lay eggs without interruption. Her retinue will feed her, spread her pheromones around the colony, keep her safe, even carry away her poop.
Do you notice any bees that seem to follow her around or visit her repeatedly?

Does A Queen Sting?

Female bees are the only bees that have stingers. A worker bee (which is always female) has a barbed stinger and will die after stinging a human, because the barbed stinger and part of the bee's vital insides stay attached to your skin as she flies away.  

A queen bee does not have a barbed stinger, so it will not die after stinging a human. However a queen bee is also not likely to sting a human. A queen will typically only sting another queen bee should a need arise to fight to death to get or keep her seat on the throne - more about that super interesting topic in another blog post some day.

What Is She Doing In This Video?

After mating, which is only done once at the beginning of their lifetime, queen bees become negatively phototactic, which means they will repel from the light. Queens are usually very deliberate and slow when they walk around the comb, looking for a cell to lay a new egg in. You can tell in this video by her occasional scurrying she is not happy with this bright light. While this queen is less likely to lay eggs while I have her outside of her dark and safe hive, we can still see some neat observations of how she inspects cells with her head and forelegs, and how worker bees act around her.

What are some things you are seeing, hearing, noticing, or wondering in this video? Throw it all down in the comments!