Weekly Reading #2

Bee Lifecycle

1. It is hard to choose just three interesting elements from this article because all of what I read was brand new and bizarre knowledge. I would have to say that the amount of time it takes for a fully grown adult bee to emerge from the wax cell is quite amazing, because I never thought it would take that long for a tiny insect to grow. The whole idea of the wax cell is also very fascinating. Another interesting fact was that there are different roles of the bees. In this instance, the nurse bee who feeds the larva, and that the larva is fed something that is produced from the head of a worker bee. The third most interesting fact I found was that once the adult is fully developed, it has an orientation and is then assigned a proper job in the hive. I found it so strange that these bees are so sophisticated almost, and have specially assigned occupations.

2. Something I will try to look for next time in the garden or apiary are any wax cells containing growing bees and larvae. I will also look for queen bees hatching larvae and nurse bees feeding larvae.

3. A question I have from this article is how the worker bees produce Royal Jelly, and how do the nurse bees obtain it from them. I also would like to know how the bees know how much time to spend feeding the larvae, and how long they wait until they incase or seal them in the wax casing.