queen

…or classes, within a colony: queens, males, and workers. Male ants play no part in everyday nest activities. They live only for a short time, occur in limited numbers, and are virtual parasites of the colony, which must feed them. The fertile female, the queen, performs only one task: egg…

… sometimes stings the nest-building Bombus queen to death. There are then no nest-building larvae produced to compete with the parasitic larvae for the attention of the workers. See also cuckoo bee.

…aiding the reproduction of a queen, who is typically their mother. Such assistance often takes the form of foraging for food, caring for the young, and maintaining and protecting the nest.

…not attain sexual maturity, and queens, females that are larger than the workers. The males, or drones, are larger than the workers and are present only in early summer. The workers and queens have stingers, whereas the drones are stingless.

Back in the parent colony, the first queen to emerge after the mother queen departs with the swarm immediately attempts to destroy the others. If two or more emerge at the same time, they fight to the death. When the surviving virgin is…

It usually consists of the queen bee, a fertilized female capable of laying a thousand or more eggs per day; from a few to 60,000 sexually undeveloped females, the worker bees; and from none to 1,000 male bees, or drones. The female of most species of bees is equipped with…

… with colonies dependent on a queen. The most ubiquitous and well known of these is the western honeybee (Apis mellifera), from which most commercial honey is harvested. A western honeybee queen can live up to five years—a remarkable lifespan given that the workers typically live only about six weeks during…

In the honeybee the single queen in the hive secretes a pheromone known as the queen substance (oxodecenoic acid), which is taken up by the workers and passed throughout the colony by food sharing. So long as the queen substance is present, all members are informed that the queen is…

…royal pair, a king and queen. They have developed from winged forms (alates) that have flown from a parent colony and shed their wings. Because they spend time outside of the colony on the mating flight, they have hardened, pigmented bodies and large compound eyes. The primary reproductives have several…

…consisting of one or several queens, a few drones (males), and sterile females called workers. The queen, a fertilized female, begins the colony in the spring by building a small nest and laying eggs that hatch into workers. The latter enlarge the paperlike nest, which is composed of chewed dry…