2006-09-26 04:23:36 · 5 answers · asked by talula 2 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Other - Science
A honey bee colony consists of mostly girls, but not only girls. The most important bee, from a survival perspective, is the queen bee. She is the only fertile female in the hive, and she lays the eggs that all of the other bees hatch from. Almost all of those bees will be female "workers." They are not fertile, but they are responsible for feeding the larvae and retrieving nectar to feed the hive. A few of the bees are male "drones." All of the males are fertile. Each year, the workers feed a special substance called "royal jelly" to a very small number of the larvae, and this causes them to become queens. However, the first queen to mature will actually kill all of the other queens. Then, she will mate with the drones, and spend the whole rest of her life laying eggs. The drones then die, their jobs done, because the workers stop feeding them. If the queen dies without a replacement, the worker bees will start laying eggs. But because the eggs cannot be fertilized, the larvae will all be male, and drones are unable to sustain the colony. This results in the failure of the hive.
2006-09-26 04:25:44 · answer #1 · answered by DavidK93 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
There are three types of bees - queens, drones and workers. Only drones are male - the rest are all female. In fact the drones are more or less flying sperm - they are "haploid" in chromosome number, having only half the number of chromosomes of normal bees. Sometimes a queen will lay an unfertilized, haploid egg which will develop into a drone. Drones fly around until they encounter a virgin queen; they die after mating with her. So, normally in a bee hive there are no males, only females.
2006-09-26 04:40:37 · answer #2 · answered by astazangasta 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
No! lol how would they reproduce? I believe they are referred to as queens & workers. At least I know thats the way it is for carpenter bees.
2006-09-26 04:26:42 · answer #3 · answered by MANDEE 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The ones you see flying around are generally sterile females; the males and queen generally stay at the hive.
2006-09-26 04:30:48 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
No that is not true. They need a male and female bee to reproduce.
2006-09-26 04:27:43 · answer #5 · answered by bubbles26 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋