Honeybee Flashcards
Honeybee scientific name
Apis mellifera
Who are the authors of honeybee
Candace Fleming
Eric Rohmann
What gender are worker bees?
Female
What does a newly emerged apis eat to grow strong?
Pollen
What is Apis’s first job in the hive
Cleaning
What is Apis’s second job?
Nursing
At what age does Apis develop special, expansive glands behind her face
Three days
What are the glands that apis develops at three days old for?
Nursing the other larvae with milky sweet liquid
At what age does Apis leave the nursery?
8 days
Why does Apis leave the nursery on the eighth day of life?
Queen tending
How many eggs does a queen produce in a day?
Two thousand!
How big is a honeybee egg?
Half the size of a grain of rice
What color is a honeybee egg
Pearly white
What is queen tending?
The worker bees groom, feed and examine the queen bee because she doesn’t have time to take care of herself
What does Apis use to examine the queen bee?
Their tongues
What does Apis use to groom the queen bee?
Their forelegs
What does Apis use to pick up the queens scent ?
Their antennae, legs and tongues
What does the queens scent convey to the rest of the nest when they smell it?
That the queen is healthy and safe
What is Apis’s 4th job?
Comb building
At what age does Apis begin making flakes of white wax in her abdominal glands?
12 days
What is the flaky white wax produced at 12 days old used for?
Comb building
Where on the bee are the comb building glands located
Her abdomen
Where on the honeybee are the glands for nursing located
Behind her face
At what age does Apis start food handling ?
15 days
What are honeybees jaws shaped like?
Spoons, spoon-shaped
What does Apis use to shape wax into a comb?
Her spoon-shaped jaws and her legs
What does a forager bee bring to Apis ?
Nectar
How does Apis thicken the nectar
Using her tongue to fold and unfold it over and over
What does the thickened nectar become as it ripens over a few days?
Honey
What job does Apis start at 18 days old?
Guarding
At what age does Apis go outside of the nest
18 days
At what age does Apis fly!?
25 days
What does Apis use to test the air and sniff other bees to see if they belong?
Her antennae
What do robber bees do?
Steal honey
How fast does Apis wings beat when flying?
200 times per second !
What is propolis?
A sticky plant sap used as bee glue
What kind of flowers does Apis follow the floral odor for miles?
Milkweed, coneflower, clover
What does Apis carry swallowed nectar she wants to take home in?
A specialized sac called a honey stomach
How is the field pollinated by bees
Pollen from each flower visited for nectar clings to her bristly legs and is carried to each subsequent flower
How does Apis communicate where the flowers with sweet nectar are?
By dancing, the other bees listen to the vibration of her dance
How many miles does Apis travel between nest and flowers collecting nectar ?
500 miles
How many flowers does Apis visit while collecting nectar?
30,000
How long does Apis live?
35 days
How much honey is produced from all the nectar Apis collects during her lifetime?
1/12th of a teaspoon of honey
Visibly, how can you tell that Apis’s life is coming to an end?
She gets thinner, slower, loses her hair and her wings fray and tatter
What are the 3 sections of the honeybees body from front to back
Head/thorax/abdomen
How many pairs of wings does Apis have?
Two pairs
How many pairs of legs does Apis have?
Three pairs of legs
How many eyes does Apis have ?
Five
How many antennae does Apis have
Two
What fraction of American food is in someway a product of honeybee pollination?
1/3 , one third
What are reasons scientists believe bee populations are declining?
Pesticides
Climate change
Disease
Loss of habitat
What country has developed insect sized drones capable of artificially pollinating flowers
Japan
How many species of bees are there in the world
20000
What kind of bees are the best pollinators of blueberries and tomatoes
Bumblebees
What kind of bees are the best pollinators for alfalfa?
Leaf-cutter bees
What color flowers do bees prefer
Yellow
Blue
Purple
Name some other plants bees love
Sage
Lavender
Bee balm
Heather
How many bees are in a colony
20,000 to 60,000!
How many groups are colonies divided into and what are they?
Three,
Queen
Workers
Drones
What gender are drone bees
Male
What gender are worker bees
Female
What job do drone bees have?
Their sole purpose is mating with the queen
How many days does it take a worker bee to grow
21 days from egg to worker bee
How many days does it take a fresh egg to hatch?
Three days, a larva hatches from the egg
How many days for a larva to spin a cocoon ?
Eight days
What develops from the larva inside of its cocoon?
A pupa
How many days for the pupa to shed its cocoon?
21 days
In the United States are most honeybees raised in the wild or by beekeepers?
Beekeepers
How many beekeepers are there in the United States
212,000
How many man-made bee colonies are there in the United States
Almost 3 million
What interesting things have scientists been able to train bees to smell
Bombs and dead bodies
What are the kinds of communication dances honeybees do?
The round dance
The figure eight dance
What does the round dance communicate
That food is nearby
What does the figure eight dance communicate
Where and how far away flowers are
In the figure eight dance how is the flowers distance communicated
By the length of the dances straight vibrating run
In the figure eight dance how is the direction of the flowers communicated
By the angle of the dance on the honeycomb in relation to the sun
In the figure eight dance how is the quality of the food communicated
By the intensity of the waggle
How long do queen bees live for
Two to three years
During the summer how many eggs can a queen bee lay
2,000 eggs a day
What is a queen bees job
To lay eggs and produce chemicals that guide the behavior of other bees
What group of bees do we only see flying around outside
Worker bees
What are Apis’s two big eyes called
Compound eyes
What are Apis’s three small eyes called
Ocelli
What are ocelli used for
Determining the brightness and intensity of light
What are Apis’s compound eyes used for
Distinguishing light and color
In what part of Apis would you find her stinger and venom sac
Her abdomen
Where would you find Apis’s pollen baskets
Her hind legs
What 3 main functions does the proboscis have
Sucking
Food exchange
Communication
What is a pheromone?
A chemical that directs or changes behavior
Apis jobs in order
Cleaning Nursing Queen tending Comb building Food handling Guarding Foraging (flying)
What medal did honeybee book win
The Robert Sibert Medal
Honeybee book was named an orbis Pictus award honor book by who
National council of teachers of English
