Apis mellifera

Description: European honey bees are variable in color, but are some shade of black or brown intermixed with yellow. The bee ranges from 3/8 to 3/4 of an inch long, with workers being the smallest and the queen being the largest. A queen bee is elongate and has a straight stinger with no barbs. A worker bee has hind legs specialized for collecting pollen - each leg is flattened and covered with long fringed hairs that form a pollen basket. A worker bee's stinger has barbs. A drone bee is stout-bodied and has large eyes.

Life History: European honey bees are social insects with a hive typically consisting of a single queen, between 6,000 and 60,000 workers, and a few hundred to a few thousand drones. Upon hatching in the spring, the queen bee destroys all unhatched queens, kills any hatched queens, and takes a mating flight where she mates with several males. The queen stores the sperm and uses it throughout her life to fertilize eggs. After returning from her mating flight, the queen begins to lay eggs and continues to do so throughout the summer. Three days after being laid, an egg hatches into a worm-like larva. The larva then molts each day for four days into a pupa. The pupa goes into a resting stage for a few days and emerges as an adult honey bee.

New European honey bee hives are created by swarming - the original queen and several thousand workers will leave the nest, typically in May or June but sometimes in September or October, and seek a new location in which to build a wax comb hive. The swarm will cluster on a branch near the original nest while scouts locate a suitable nesting site. This process can take a few hours or days. A honey bee colony can survive for up to several years.

Design: The honey bee hive is a completely structured and classified home. The bees have a purpose for all that they do and each aspect is vital for their survival. For example, each week the honey bee in its cycle has a new job. The first week after emerging from its cell, it will become a nursing bee. It provides food for the larvae. The second week the honey bee will lay wax. The third week, the honey bee becomes guard and will protect the hive. The fourth and fifth week the honey bee collects nectar and pollen and then dies. In the winter, the honey bee will live longer since it is not working as in the warm seasons. Another aspect of its design, is that the cells are perfectly created in a hexaconical shape with perfect dimensions. The horizontal cells are for the workers and drones. The vertical cells are for the queens (which are usually not evident unless the hive is ready to swarm). The same egg that is in the worker cell, could be the same egg that could emerge as a queen if placed in the queen cell and given more royal jelly. There is so much more that God has designed in the honey bee, that it requires much reading to comprehend this aspect.

Habitat: Wild European honey bee nests are found in hollow trees or man-made structures. Managed colonies are often kept in wooden hives. Flowers in meadows, open woods, agricultural areas, and yards and gardens are visited by worker bees.

Distribution: This species is found in temperate, subtropical, and tropical areas worldwide. Here in the Sacramento Valley, the European honey bee has flourished.

Status: This species is common.

Removal: Honey bees are important for the environment and are vital for many farmers that need their crops pollinated. For this reason, it is ideal to have the bees removed in a humane manner. When looking for a bee removalist, make sure and ask if they are going to save the bees or exterminate them. In most cases it is possible to save the bees. Also, in most cases exterminating the bees will cause some damage to your structure--especially since the average hive in a wall contains 30-50 lbs of honey. Call a professional.

Resources:
Honey Bee (AgriLIFE Extension, Texas A & M System)

University of Georgia Honey Bee Program (University of Georgia)

Honey Bees, Bumble Bees, Carpenter Bees, and Sweat Bees (R. Wright, P. Mulder, and H. Reed, Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service)

Stinging Insects: Honey Bees (K. Gardner, C. Klass, and N. Calderone, Cornell University - Master Beekeeper Program)

Pollination and Honey Bees (R. D. Fell, Mid-Atlantic Orchard Monitoring Guide, April 27, 2005)

Honeybee Biology (Ross E. Koning, Plant Physiology Website, 1994)