western honeybee: Quick Facts

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Facts

Also Known As	domestic honeybee • Apis mellifera • western honey bee • European honeybee • European domestic honeybee

Photos and Videos

A honeybee (Apis mellifera) collects nectar from the bright yellow center of a violet flower, with delicate petals and a blurred green background.

A honeybee with translucent wings and striped abdomen stands on a white background.

Crop pollination

Illustration showing three honeybees (Apis mellifera) side by side for size comparison: a small worker bee, a larger queen bee with an elongated abdomen, and a robust drone bee with a broader body.

A worker honeybee with translucent wings and a yellow pollen sac on its hind leg stands against a white background.

This medical illustration explains a systemic anaphylactic response to bee venom in someone with type I hypersensitivity. It shows a bee sting injecting venom into the skin, which then enters the bloodstream and spreads throughout the body. The diagram highlights how the immune system reacts, including mast cell activation and the release of substances that cause symptoms such as swelling, low blood pressure, breathing difficulty, digestive issues, and skin reactions. The human figure is annotat

Diagram showing the life cycle of a honeybee, with stages from egg, larva, and pupa to adult emerging from a honeycomb cell. A queen bee lays an egg, a worker bee feeds the larva, and the adult bee emerges on day 21.

Pollination services

What's causing the mysterious mass death of honeybees?

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Topics

African honeybee Africanized honeybee Beekeeping Tropilaelaps clareae 9-oxodecenoic acid colony collapse disorder varroa mite Apis social bee stingless bee bumblebee