“Aerodynamically, the bumble bee shouldn't be able to fly, but the bumble bee doesn't know it so it goes on flying anyway.” Mary Kay Ash
I Didn't Know That (fun facts about bees)
Did you know that the average honey bee will actually make only one twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in its lifetime?
Clicking on the links below will direct you to a web sites filled with amazing and educational facts like the one above that can be used as engagement tools for your lesson.
Clicking on the links below will direct you to a web sites filled with amazing and educational facts like the one above that can be used as engagement tools for your lesson.
Home Sweet Home
Bees can live in a variety of homes, whether they are natural or artificial. The document link provided gives descriptions and photos of some of the most common hives found along with structure details and why bees swarm.
What's for Dinner?
Honey bees eat Nectar and pollen when they are outdoors. The nectar mixes with enzymes within bee stomachs to produce honey. It also may be mixed with pollen to produce protein-rich beebread.
Honey and stored pollen are what the queen and the workers eat while they overwinter in their hives.
Honey and stored pollen are what the queen and the workers eat while they overwinter in their hives.
Worker bees gather both pollen and nectar from flowers to feed to the larvae and other members of the colony. Nectar is the sweet fluid produced by flowers to attract bees and other insects, birds and mammals. Worker bees drink the nectar and store it in a pouch-like structure called the crop. They fly back to the hive and regurgitate the nectar to other "house bees." The house bees mix the nectar with enzymes and deposit it into a cell where it remains exposed to air for a time to allow some of the water to evaporate. The bees help the process along by fanning the open cells with their wings. The cell containing the resulting honey is later capped with beeswax and kept for future use.
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Pollen is the yellowish or greenish powder-like substance that sometimes comes from flowers. It may be quite sticky. It contains the male contribution to the next generation of plants. Honey bees mix the pollen with some nectar to form a mixture called beebread that is a protein-rich food used to feed the larvae. As the worker bees move from flower to flower, they spread pollen to many different plants, including important foods such as vegetables (squash and cucumbers), fruits (apples, watermelon, plums, sweet cherries, citrus), nuts (almonds), plants grown for seed (sunflower), and animal feed crops such as clover.
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Honey bees are attracted to sweets, especially liquid sweets in the form of open cans of soft drinks. This is why they sometimes gather around eating areas at open air events, like fairs and carnivals, and crawl around on straws and can or bottle tops. While bees are generally not very aggressive while foraging for food or water, they can sting when disturbed, which makes them quite unwelcome at such events.
Making Sense of Things
Sight
Honey bees and people do not see eye to eye. Humans see the colors of the rainbow; red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. Although honey bees have a fairly broad color range, they do not see red and can only differentiate between six major categories of color, including yellow, blue-green, blue, violet, and ultraviolet. They also see a color known as "bee's purple," a mixture of yellow and ultraviolet. Differentiation is not equally good throughout the range and is best in the blue-green, violet and bee's purple colors.
Taste
Honey bees have been found to be able to distinguish between sweet, sour, bitter and salt, and thus have a sense of "taste." Bees are more sensitive to salts than humans, but less sensitive to bitter flavors.
Touch
Honey bees use their antennae to gauge the width and depth of cells while constructing comb. They also communicate via touch during bee dances.
Honey bees and people do not see eye to eye. Humans see the colors of the rainbow; red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. Although honey bees have a fairly broad color range, they do not see red and can only differentiate between six major categories of color, including yellow, blue-green, blue, violet, and ultraviolet. They also see a color known as "bee's purple," a mixture of yellow and ultraviolet. Differentiation is not equally good throughout the range and is best in the blue-green, violet and bee's purple colors.
Taste
Honey bees have been found to be able to distinguish between sweet, sour, bitter and salt, and thus have a sense of "taste." Bees are more sensitive to salts than humans, but less sensitive to bitter flavors.
Touch
Honey bees use their antennae to gauge the width and depth of cells while constructing comb. They also communicate via touch during bee dances.