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Perhaps the bee is the most useful insect on our planet, because thanks to it, people of antiquity had the opportunity to taste honey. Even in antiquity, people learned to raise bees, and honey, obtained with their help, for centuries served as a favorite treat, a medicine and an important ingredient in the creation of alcoholic beverages. So a bee in ancient times was a true friend of man.

Description, structure, characteristics.

1. What does a bee look like?

According to the zoological classification, the bee belongs to the order of hymenoptera and its close relatives are wasps and ants.

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The color of the bee is well known, consisting of a black background with yellow spots. But the size of a bee, depending on its type and class, can have from 3 to 45 mm.

In the structure of the body of an insect it is conditionally possible to distinguish three parts:

• The head of the bee, which is crowned with antennas in the amount of two pieces, is also complex eyes with a faceted structure. Bee eyes are quite well developed, since they are able to distinguish almost all colors, with the exception of shades of red. In addition, the head of the insect is equipped with a special proboscis, designed to collect the nectar of the flowers. The apparatus of the mouth of the bee has cutting jaws.
• Breast of a bee, equipped with two twin wings of different sizes and three pairs of legs. The wings of a bee are connected to each other with small hooks. The legs of the bee are covered with villi, which are used for practical purposes: cleaning the antennae, removing the wax plates, etc.
• The abdomen of a bee, is the receptacle of the digestive and reproductive system of the insect. There is also a stinging apparatus and wax glands. The lower part of the abdomen is covered with long hairs, which contribute to the retention of pollen.

2. Where do the bees live?

Bees live in a very large geographical area, making it easier to respond where bees do not live than where they live. So, there are no bees only in those places where there are no flowering plants: deserts of hot sand and cold arctic tundra. In all other places there are bees.

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As for the favorite habitats of these insects, they love to settle in the crevices of the mountains, place their hives in the hollows of old trees and holes in the ground. For bees, it is important that their habitat be protected from the winds and that there be a nearby pond.

3. Bees lifestyle

Bees are collective insects that live in large families: hives and a strict hierarchy and division of labor. The composition of a bee colony includes:

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• matriarchy
• the drone
• bee working

In the society of bees, matriarchy predominated in females where the life of the hive rests completely:

• The uterus of the queen bee is responsible for the reproduction of the offspring, is also the creator of the hive.

• All the economic life of the hive resides in the worker bees, the female bees, unable to reproduce sexually. Collect the nectar from the flowers with care, protect the hive in case of danger, take care of its disposition, transfer honey, etc.

• While the task of the male bees, the drones, are only for the continuation of the species, fertilize the uterus.

4. How long does a bee live?

The useful life of a bee depends directly on its place in the society of bees, as well as on the moment of birth.

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• How long does a worker bee live? Its useful life is not excellent, and if she was born in spring or summer, then she usually has an average of one month. Such a short life expectancy is due to the hard work that the worker bee takes to extract the nectar.

If the worker bee is lucky to be born in the fall, then it can live even half a year, since it needs to survive the winter cold to be responsible for collecting honey in the spring and participate in its accumulation.

• The life of a drone is even shorter than that of a worker bee, two weeks after birth, it can fertilize the uterus and, what is more interesting, a few days after this fertilization, the drones usually die, and the rest is get rid of the worker bees, which will not let them enter the hive and also die.

  Thus, drones live in the hive only in the warm season. They do not work, they do not protect the family, they can not get food for themselves.

• The queen bee is the one that lives longer in the bee community. The average life of the uterus is 3 to 5 years, but for this it must be a valuable female and, to obtain new descendants, lives 40 times more than the rest.

Why does the queen bee live 40 times more than the rest?

The queen bee lives 40 times more than the working bees because of the miraculous nutrients in the milk liquid, which forms its diet completely.

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Their eating habits mean that only in this way can it be almost twice as large and more than twice as massive as other female bees, despite the lack of a genetic advantage.

The active ingredient in royal jelly, a chemical preparation that is made from pollen and secreted from the mast glands of the nurse bee, also helps them to be 42 percent larger and 60 percent heavier. than the rest.

The survival of a bee colony in a hive depends completely on the queen bee. Without the queen bee, all the bees in the hive eventually die. The queen of the hive is the only bee in the hive that has fully developed the reproductive organs. The queen does not control the hive. Its purpose is to lay eggs, which will become bees, which in turn will play other roles in the hive.

The larvae that the hive chooses as potential queens are kept in the queen's cages. The real cells are different from the usual ones that are used in the rest of the hive, because they are larger and are arranged vertically instead of horizontally, so the queen hangs upside down during its development.

The possible larvae of the queen should be identified within four days after the placement of the larvae.

When it is time for the queen to leave her in a cage, she gnaws the lid. When the queen is chewing, she makes a sound that is thought to warn the other queens of her arrival. Working bees will try to keep several young queens alive to have reserve queens in case the first queen can not find a mate or survive the mating season.

When a new queen is old enough, she leaves the hive. While away from the hive, you must find several drones from another hive to mate. It is important that the uterus encounters at least twelve drones during this mating flight.

The seed that the uterus collects during this time will be used throughout its life. If the queen can not make a mating flight, the survival of the rest of the hive is in danger. Most hives try to keep several virgin females alive to prevent this danger.

In most hives, the old queen continues to lay eggs, however, when her time comes, she leaves the hive.

Unfortunately, after meeting the queen, the drones die.

In general, it is easy to identify the queen bee when surrounded by other bees. Its belly is much bigger and longer than other bee hives. Many beekeepers for a faster recognition of the uterus mark it with special paint.

The average life expectancy of the queen bee is 3 to 4 years.

5. What do bees feed on?

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Bees feed on pollen and floral nectar. Through a special nectar enters the goiter, where it is processed in honey. By collecting pollen and nectar, bees fulfill a very important and useful function of flower pollination. In search of food, bees can fly up to 10 km per day.

6. Species of bees

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According to there are 21 thousand species of bees. In addition, the bee family includes around 520 genera, of which the most important are:

• Apis mellifera, European honey bee
• Apis cerana, oriental honey bee
• Apis florea, small honey bee
• Apis dorsata, large honey bee
• Apis nigrocincta, honey bee from the Philippines.
• Apis koschevnikovi, bee of Koschevnikov
• Apis andreniformis, dark small honey bee
• Apis nuluensis, honey bee of Borneo.
• Laborious apis, honey bee of the Himalayas.

7. Enemies of bees

Bees have their enemies, usually other insects, including their close relatives, wasps and ants. Some birds also feed on bees.

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8. The use of bees.

• In medicine
  Bees among other things, have a great advantage in medicine, even their poison in small doses is useful in diseases such as sciatica, arthritis and nerves.
  Propolis or bee tail contains essential oils, wax and pollen. Medicinal properties: analgesic (stronger than novocaine 5.2 times); Antiprurite; Antimicrobial Tones the body, improves immunity; Strengthens tooth enamel; Anesthesia and softens calluses.

• In the agriculture
  The role of bees as pollinators manifests more fully in the garden. Fruit trees and berries, along with other crops, for seed formation and fruiting need cross-pollination, which is done by insects.

Orchard plantation crops more than other crops, depend on the pollination of bees, as the gardens bloom in early spring, when there are still few wild pollinators in the wild.

In addition, the intensity of the work of wild pollinators does not compare at all with the work of the bees, which collect not only the nectar, but also the pollen and collect it continuously, in the reserve, during the entire flowering period.

Most wild pollinators do not store pollen or nectar and, therefore, only occasionally visit a small amount of flowers, unlike what the bee does, working continuously during a flight.

The value of bees as pollinators is increased by the fact that the number of wild pollinators (bumble bees, flies, solitary bees (immediate) and butterflies) decreases as the general culture of agriculture increases.

Interesting facts about bees

• Many myths and legends are associated with bees, for example, according to the beliefs of the ancient Egyptians, the soul of the deceased left a person in the form of a bee.
• Even primitive people noticed that the nests of bees are a valuable prey and, as a result, they were hunted. But it was a dangerous and difficult matter, since the bees could have made the honey killer angry.
• In ancient Greece, beekeepers first learned to insert partitions in bee hives, and with their help to eliminate excess honey. And the beginning of the "scientific beekeeping" sat the great philosopher and scholar of antiquity, Aristotle.
• The famous ancient Greek physician Hippocrates wrote a whole scientific treatise on the health benefits of honey, and according to legend, a swarm of bees landed on the tomb of a famous doctor, making a special healing honey that helps many diseases.

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