| Honey bees are social insects in the family Apidae, order Hymenoptera. The most important species to humans is Apis millifera, the honey bee. Honey bees live in colonies or bee hives. Bees have two pairs of wings and compound eyes. Beekeepers make hives for the bees out of straw, pottery, or wooden boxes. Wild bees make their hives in hollow trees or logs or sometimes under the eaves of houses. Worker bees stand guard at the entrance of the hive, keeping out bees from other hives. Honey bees protect their hive by stinging intruders. Bees communicate with each other with pheromones. Pheromones are body chemicals that allow bees and other animals to talk to each other by smell. Bees smell pheromones and other scents with their antennae and can tell whether a bee is from the same hive, a worker, a queen bee, or is warning about danger. Bees can fight most honey robbers like skunks, bears, and wasps who come to raid the hive. When a honey bee stings, the barbs on the stinger get stuck in the victim, and the stinger is pulled out of the bee's body. The bee dies shortly after stinging. Queen bees however can sting many times and can pull their stinger out of the victim's skin. The honeycombs inside the hive are made up of small boxes called cells. The cells are six-sided or hexagons. They are tilted so that the honey does not flow out. All the cells together make up the comb. The comb is made from wax that bees make with their wax glands. The wax comes out from openings on the ... |
