A Day in the Life of a Honeybee
A Day in the Life of a Honeybee
The younger and the older workerbees in a honeybee hive have different tasks.
The younger bees are responsible for doing the housekeeping within the hive which includes maintaining the temperature. They maintain the air flow and temperature control by flapping their wings to make it cooler, or clustering around the queen and shivering to make it warmer.
Older bees are out at the crack of dawn, when there is ideally a lot of dew. They go to flowers to gather pollen, nectar and water. Most of the water they carry back to the hive to supply water for the needs of the hive. Their entire activity from dawn to dusk is the making of trips from and to the hive.
We in developed countries would not expect to carry on our daily schedules/activities if we had to search for water and live in a primitive hut. And yet, this is essentially what we expect of the domesticated honeybee population.
Honeybees have no requirement for the level of gardening/agriculture which we expect them to help us sustain. Therefore it is up to us to help them help us.
With the scale of today’s agriculture, honeybees are often overworked and under appreciated. They are also subject to environmental stressors which were not present when the Langstroth hives were first designed.
With this in mind, we can compare the primitive hut with our advanced technologically welcoming bee space.
The substantial differences between the Langstroth historical methodology of honeybee keeping and our Honeybee Habitats are: size, shape, weight, materials, portability, water supply, methods of operation, placement, inspection, observation, electromagnetic permeability, acoustical protection, thermal regulation, disease control, laser-protection from hornets and other pests — including bears — and ease of harvesting procedures.
By providing honeybees with ease and efficiency, technology can serve nature for the benefit of honeybees and humanity — and a day in the life of a honeybee can be truly healthy.
July 01, 2019