The Honey Bee hive is one of the best run, most efficient operations in existence, it is no wonder that the beehive has long been a representation for industry. There are three main types of bees: Queen, Drone and Worker Bee.
Every bee in the hive has a distinct role and job to perform. Contrary to popular belief, the bees that gather pollen and make honey are female bees and are referred to as the Worker Bees.
The life of a worker bee goes like this:
- Day 1 Egg Stage: The queen lays an egg into the honeycomb.
- Days 7-21 Pupa Stage: New cute fuzzy little bees will emerge from their comb on the 21st day.
Hive Roles
The new little bee will begin their first job right after emerging from their cell. Their first task will be cleaning the cell they just emerged from. They will generally spend 1-2 days doing this. Bees are very clean by nature and the Queen will not lay additional eggs in the cell until this is done.
Bees will then move onto their role as a Nurser bee. Just like the Nurser bee who fed them, they will begin to excrete the needed Royal Jelly to feed to new Larva. After 5 days of this role and mastering the art, bees will move onto feeding Royal Jelly to new Drone and Queen Cells until day 11.
At this point bees are able to help build honeycomb with wax excretion. The honeycomb is a wonder all in itself, to look at the uniformity in the cells and pattern is a natural wonder all in itself. Bees will spend around 6 days performing this role and during this time will build comb, and repair comb.