Have you ever thought if there is a 'King Bee' in wildlife? We all know that the Queen bee is the most important insect in a colony of bees. Without it, the colony will collapse and disappear.
But, interestingly, queen bees do not necessarily need king bees, in order to survive. In fact, men bees (or drone bees) that will mate with the queen bee immediately die after the mating period. Another interesting fact is that queen bees store millions of sperm, that they don't need men afterwards.
Is there a 'King Bee'
(Photo : Photo by Sean Gallup/Getty Images)
Worker bees surround a queen, who is marked with a yellow spot on her back, in the colony of beekeper Reiner Gabriel in the garden of his home near Berlin on April 25, 2013 in Blankenfelde, Germany. Local beekeepers claim their yearly loss rates within their bee populations has gone from an average of 10% per year to 30% per year over the last 10 years, though they are unsure whether the cause lies with a mite and a virus it might be spreading or with the increased use of certain pesticides by local farmers. According to a recent report prepared by Greenpeace seven pesticides currently in use in Europe present a real danger to bees. Bees are essential in nature in pollenating a wide variety of plants and trees.
There's no such thing as 'king bee' in the wildlife. A honeybee queen is the single most important bee in a colony, as she produces the population in a colony.
Studies show that the mating between queen bee and its drone bees are quite complicated. As explained via Orkin page,when a virgin queen bee flies to thousands of male bees, the drone bees will immediately mount the queen and insert his 'endophallus.'
Once the ejacul*tion starts, the endophallus will be ripped from the drone bee's body. After mating, the drone bee will die immediately.
Male honey bees are only capable to mate within seven to 10 times before it dies from mating. When the queen honeybee is done in its mating flight, she will store all the sperm from all the mating periods-- this results to over 100 million sperms found inside her body.
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What does 'Queen failure' means in a bee colony
(Photo : Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)
Beekeeper and Chairman of The London Beekeepers Association John Chapple installs a new bee hive on an urban rooftop garden in Islington on July 1, 2009 in London, England. The Queen bee can be seen with a green dot on her back. The UK has an estimated 274,000 bee colonies producing an average of 6000 tonnes of honey per year. An estimated 44,000 beekeepers manage these hives with each one containing around 20,000 bees. It is estimated that honeybee numbers in the UK have fallen between ten and 15 per cent in the last two years.
Since the queen bee collects all the sperm to be used to reproduce, it needs to perform its duties well in order for the colony to stay surviving.
Alison McAfee, first author of the study and a bee researcher at North Carolina State University via Scientific American, warns that "honeybees are responsible for around between $16 billion and $20 billion worth of economic contribution to agriculture."
This means, if the queen bee decided to not reproduce or so-called 'queen failure', the colony of bees will soon plummet its population.
Once this happens, this could be a problem in nature and in the world.
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FAQs
Male bees are Drones – not king bees!
While male honey bees, known as drones, do exist, their purpose is singular: mating with a virgin queen. Once they fulfill this duty, their role ends. They die shortly after mating, leaving behind a legacy of fertilized eggs.
Does a queen bee need sperm? ›
The queen mates with many males, but only early in life, storing all the sperm that she'll use in her lifetime in her spermatheca, an abdominal organ that looks like a tiny pearl. When the sperm begin to die, the queen can't produce as many fertilized eggs. That causes the colony's population to decline.
What happens when a queen bee runs out of sperm? ›
However, only five to six million are stored within the queen's spermatheca. The queen uses only a few of these sperm at a time in order to fertilize eggs throughout her life. If a queen runs out of sperm in her lifetime, new generations of queens will mate and produce their own colonies.
Does a queen bee need a king? ›
The hive contains no king bee. Bees do not require a king to mate with the queen. regularly. A queen can store up to 6 million sperm.
Why is only the queen bee fertile? ›
The fact that the queen bee is the only fertile female in the hive is motivated by a precise element: it is the only one to have fully developed ovaries and spermatheca.
Can any bee become a queen? ›
Every larva receives about 10,000 nurse bee feeding visits during development - this means that each larva is fed on average every 43 seconds! It is possible for all female larvae under three days old to become a queen, though larger, more vigorous queens are produced with the youngest larvae, less than one day old.
Does the queen bee mate with all the males? ›
The surviving virgin queen will fly out on a sunny, warm day to a drone congregation area where she will mate with 12–15 drones. If the weather holds, she may return to the drone congregation area for several days until she is fully mated. Mating occurs in flight.
What happens if a queen bee dies? ›
Lastly, when a honey bee queen suddenly dies, an urgent and unplanned supersedure occurs. Worker honey bees identify several larvae within the proper age range and begin to condition these larvae to become queens.
What happens to a queen bee after mating? ›
Once she has mated, she flies back to the hive to assume her royal role...and beekeepers now call her a mated queen. It will take her a few days to start laying eggs, during which her abdomen grows larger, making flight clumsy and difficult. She will now stay exclusively inside the hive.
What is the lifespan of a queen bee? ›
Queens, who are responsible for producing and laying eggs, live for an average of two to three years, but have been known to live five years. Domesticated honey bee queens may die earlier, as beekeepers "re-queen" the hives frequently. A single queen lays thousands of eggs throughout her life.
Bees are insects and have to conserve as much water as possible to prevent themselves drying out, so they don't urinate. They secrete uric acid and ammonia waste from their malpighian tubes, which is often white in colour and contains very small amounts of water.
Are queen bees born or made? ›
Queens are raised from the same fertilised female eggs as workers bees. A newly hatched female larva is neither queen or worker caste. There are small differences in the composition of royal jelly fed to larvae destined to be a queen or a worker. The variation in diet starts from the time of larvae hatching.
Why are there no king bees? ›
No, there is no such thing as a king bee.
A queen bee rules over honey bees and bumble bees. Male bees are purely there to mate, and some pay for it with their life.
What happens when a new queen bee is born? ›
Inside these larger cells, potential queen bees are fed royal jelly and over time a new potential queen is born. After that, it's a matter of survival of the fittest: after emerging from her cell, a new queen bee will instinctively set out to kill her sisters – her competition for the throne.
Do bees ever reject a queen? ›
When a new queen comes into a hive and the bees are not ready to accept her, they will often try to kill her or remove her.
Can you get a King Bee? ›
A drone is a male honey bee that mates with a virgin queen bee to make her fertile. Is there a king honeybee? No. All male bees are drones.
What is a King Bee? ›
king bee in American English
noun. (in South Midland and Southern US dialect) a self-important person.
Is a King Bee rare? ›
The King Bee is a legendary pet in Adopt Me! that was released on November 8, 2019. It is obtainable by using a Honey in the Coffee Shop, which costs 199. The King Bee is also obtainable through trading. There is a 4 in 40 (10%) chance of taming a King Bee from a Honey.
Why is there only a queen bee? ›
The Queen Bee plays a vital role in the hive because she is the only female with fully developed ovaries. The queen's two primary purposes are to produce chemical scents that help regulate the unity of the colony and to lay lots of eggs.
