131 bee facts, all checked

What is a bee?

1. 1 There are over 20,000 known bee species in the world, and about 4,000 of them are native to the United States. USGS
2. 2 Bees are grouped into seven recognised families. Wikipedia
3. 3 Over 90% of bee species, including mason bees, carpenter bees, leafcutter bees and sweat bees, are solitary. Wikipedia
4. 4 Unlike their wasp and ant relatives, which eat meat, bees are plant-eaters: they live on nectar and pollen. Wikipedia
5. 5 Bees differ from wasps by having branched, plume-like hairs, which pick up pollen. Wikipedia
6. 6 Bees probably appeared in the Early Cretaceous, around 124 million years ago, on the supercontinent of West Gondwana. Wikipedia
7. 7 The oldest bee fossil in amber is Cretotrigona prisca, about 70 million years old, found in New Jersey. Wikipedia
8. 8 The ancestors of bees were predatory wasps that hunted other insects. Wikipedia
9. 9 The most common bees in the Northern Hemisphere are the sweat bees (Halictidae), small and often mistaken for wasps or flies. Wikipedia
10. 10 About 10% of the bees in the United States have yet to be named or described. USGS
11. 11 Some of the oldest pictures of bees are rock paintings in Spain dated to about 15,000 BC. Wikipedia
12. 12 The sweat bee genus Lasioglossum is the largest bee genus, with over 1,800 species. Wikipedia

Anatomy & senses

1. 13 Bees have two large compound eyes and three small simple eyes (ocelli) on top of the head. Wikipedia
2. 14 Bumblebees have five eyes: two big compound eyes and three small simple eyes on top. BBCT
3. 15 Bees have four wings. The smaller hind wings hook onto the forewings with a row of tiny hooks, so they beat as one. Wikipedia
4. 16 The last three segments of a female bee's abdomen are modified into the sting. Wikipedia
5. 17 Bees can see ultraviolet patterns on flowers that we cannot. Wikipedia
6. 18 Bumblebees can also detect the electric fields of flowers. Wikipedia
7. 19 Honeybees and bumblebees carry pollen in pollen baskets (corbiculae) on their hind legs, flattened areas fringed with curved hairs. Wikipedia
8. 20 Most bee species carry pollen on brushes of hairs (scopae) on their hind legs or under their abdomens. Wikipedia
9. 21 The front legs of bees carry little combs for cleaning their antennae. Wikipedia
10. 22 Bumblebee wings can beat up to 240 times a second. BBCT
11. 23 A honey bee flaps its wings between 200 and 230 times a second when flying. BBC
12. 24 Bumblebee tongues vary from about 6 mm to over 20 mm. Long-tongued species like the garden bumblebee prefer deep tubular flowers such as foxgloves. BBCT
13. 25 Bumblebees leave a "smelly footprint" on flowers, so other bumblebees can tell a flower has just been emptied. BBCT
14. 26 A bumblebee's flight muscles must be at least 30 °C before it can fly. It warms up by shivering. Wikipedia
15. 27 A bumblebee's thick pile of hairs insulates it; bumblebees from cold places have longer hairs than tropical ones. Wikipedia
16. 28 Worker honey bees make wax from eight glands on the underside of the abdomen. Wikipedia
17. 29 Honey bee drones have eyes twice the size of workers' and queens', which helps them spot queens when mating in flight. Wikipedia

Honey bees

1. 30 Only bees in the genus Apis are true honey bees. Wikipedia
2. 31 Only two honey bee species have been domesticated: the western honey bee (Apis mellifera) and the eastern honey bee (Apis cerana). Wikipedia
3. 32 Honey bees probably originated in South and South-east Asia, where every living species except Apis mellifera is native. Wikipedia
4. 33 There were no honey bees in the Americas until Europeans brought them. Wikipedia
5. 34 Europeans brought western honey bees to North America in 1622, when colonies were shipped from England to Virginia. Wikipedia
6. 35 A honey bee colony usually has one queen, up to a few thousand male drones in season, and tens of thousands of female workers. Wikipedia
7. 36 Drones hatch from unfertilised eggs; queens and workers hatch from fertilised eggs. Wikipedia
8. 37 All larvae start on royal jelly made by workers; a larva fed only on royal jelly becomes a queen. Wikipedia
9. 38 Young workers clean the hive and feed larvae, then build comb, receive nectar and guard the entrance, and finally become foragers. Wikipedia
10. 39 Young queens fly to a drone congregation area and mate with several drones, which die in the act. Wikipedia
11. 40 A mated honey bee queen may lay up to 2,000 eggs a day. Wikipedia
12. 41 Only honey bee workers have barbed stings, and queens' stings are smooth. Wikipedia
13. 42 Honey bees build hexagonal cells from wax they make themselves. Wikipedia
14. 43 Wax comes out as small clear scales; the workers chew it to build comb. Wikipedia
15. 44 Each honey bee makes only about a twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in her life. BBC
16. 45 About 10 million foraging trips go into one jar of honey. BBC
17. 46 A forager may visit 2,000 flowers a day. BBC
18. 47 Honey bees fly at around 13 to 15 mph and can forage up to four miles from the hive, sometimes more. BBC
19. 48 Honey bees can count up to four and remember landmarks. BBC
20. 49 An average colony gets through around 40 kilos of pollen a year. BBC
21. 50 Worldwide, honey bees produce about one billion kilograms of honey a year. BBC
22. 51 A honey bee queen can live three to four years, while a bumblebee queen lives about a year. BBCT
23. 52 When a giant hornet attacks a Japanese honey bee nest, about 500 bees ball around it and vibrate their muscles until it overheats at 47 °C. Wikipedia
24. 53 Before a colony swarms, workers raise new queens; the hive may swarm as soon as the queen cells are capped. Wikipedia
25. 54 Karl von Frisch shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for discoveries about animal behaviour, including the bee dance. Nobel Prize

The waggle dance

1. 55 The waggle dance is a figure-of-eight dance that tells other honey bees the direction and distance to food, water or a new nest site. Wikipedia
2. 56 On the vertical comb, straight up means "towards the sun"; an angle left or right of up means the same angle left or right of the sun. Wikipedia
3. 57 Distance is coded in how long the waggle run lasts: the farther the food, the longer the waggle. Wikipedia
4. 58 For food very close to the hive (about 10 m in one Italian honey bee study), bees do a round dance instead, which becomes a waggle dance as distance grows. Wikipedia
5. 59 A waggle dance can have from one to over 100 circuits. Wikipedia
6. 60 Dancers adjust their angle as the sun moves across the sky. Wikipedia
7. 61 Different honey bee species have different "dialects" of the dance. Wikipedia
8. 62 Karl von Frisch was one of the first to work out the meaning of the waggle dance. Wikipedia

Bumblebees

1. 63 There are over 250 species of bumblebee (genus Bombus), mostly in the Northern Hemisphere, with some in South America. Wikipedia
2. 64 The UK has 24 species of bumblebee. Natural History Museum
3. 65 There are about 45 bumble bee species in the United States. Xerces Society
4. 66 Bumblebees don't make honey: they don't need to store food for winter, because only the new queens survive it, hibernating. BBCT
5. 67 Bumblebees don't live in hives. Some nest underground in old mouse holes, under sheds or in compost heaps; others in thick grass, bird boxes or lofts. BBCT
6. 68 Female bumblebees can sting more than once, but generally ignore people. Wikipedia
7. 69 Cuckoo bumblebees make no nest of their own: their queens take over other bumblebee nests and the resident workers raise their young. Wikipedia
8. 70 Bumblebees can buzz-pollinate, shaking pollen loose from flowers like tomatoes by vibrating their flight muscles. Wikipedia
9. 71 Buzz pollination can increase the amount and flavour of fruit on plants such as tomatoes. BBCT
10. 72 A bumblebee can travel up to 6 km in a day looking for flowers. BBCT
11. 73 The idea that science says bumblebees "shouldn't be able to fly" is 20th-century folklore based on an over-simple calculation. Wikipedia
12. 74 In spring the queen makes wax from her own body, shapes it into a nectar pot, and lays her first eggs, which hatch into female workers. BBCT
13. 75 After four to six days the eggs hatch into white, C-shaped larvae. BBCT
14. 76 The queen keeps the nest at a constant 25 to 32 °C by shivering her flight muscles. BBCT
15. 77 Bumblebee workers only live about four to six weeks. BBCT
16. 78 New queens mate in late summer and hibernate over winter; all the other bumblebees in the nest die. BBCT
17. 79 Male bees cannot sting; only females can. BBCT
18. 80 Bumblebee colonies are much smaller than honey bee colonies, some with as few as 50 bees. Wikipedia
19. 81 Charles Darwin called them "humble-bees" in On the Origin of Species. Wikipedia
20. 82 European bumblebees have been introduced to New Zealand and Tasmania. Wikipedia

Solitary bees

1. 83 About 70% of native bees nest in the ground; most of the rest use tunnels in wood or stems. Xerces Society
2. 84 Many solitary bees spend about 11 months as eggs, larvae and pupae in the nest; the flying adult stage lasts only about three to six weeks. Xerces Society
3. 85 Cuckoo bees lay their eggs in other bees' nests, so their young eat the food another mother collected. Wikipedia
4. 86 Nomada, with over 850 species, is the largest genus of cuckoo bees. Many look surprisingly like wasps. Wikipedia
5. 87 Plasterer bees (Colletes) line their underground nest cells with a waterproof, cellophane-like natural polyester. Wikipedia
6. 88 Sweat bees are named because they like to drink salty perspiration. Xerces Society
7. 89 Mason bees nest in holes and hollow stems and build mud walls between their cells. Wikipedia
8. 90 Mason bees are docile and rarely sting, which makes them good garden pollinators. Wikipedia
9. 91 A single blue orchard bee female may make nearly 60,000 blossom visits in her life. Wikipedia
10. 92 Leafcutter bees line their nests with neat pieces they cut from leaves. Wikipedia
11. 93 Carpenter bee males cannot sting (the sting is a modified egg-laying tube), though they will buzz close to people. Wikipedia
12. 94 About 30% of North American native bees nest in old beetle tunnels in dead wood. Drilled nest blocks and logs can stand in for them. Xerces Society

Pollination

1. 95 About 75% of the world's food crop types depend at least partly on pollinators. FAO
2. 96 Pollinators contribute to about 35% of global crop production by volume. FAO
3. 97 Pollinators boost the yield of 87 of the 115 major food crops. FAO
4. 98 Over 80% of wild flowering plant species are pollinated by animals, mostly insects. FAO
5. 99 FAO counts over 25,000 bee species among the world's pollinators. FAO
6. 100 Many bees show "flower constancy", sticking to one kind of flower per trip, which helps carry the right pollen to the right plant. Wikipedia
7. 101 Pollination by native bees is estimated to be worth about $3 billion a year in the United States. Xerces Society
8. 102 Some orchids are pollinated only by male orchid bees, which collect perfumes from them. Wikipedia

Threats & conservation

1. 103 In Europe, 9.2% of the 1,965 wild bee species assessed are threatened with extinction. IUCN
2. 104 For 56.7% of European bee species, there wasn't enough data to judge their status. IUCN
3. 105 Nearly a quarter (25.8%) of Europe's bumblebee species are threatened. IUCN
4. 106 The IUCN assessed the western honey bee in Europe as Data Deficient. IUCN
5. 107 The UK has lost 97% of its wildflower meadows in the last century; habitat loss is the main driver of bumblebee declines. BBCT
6. 108 Bumblebee declines have been caused by habitat loss, the mechanisation of farming and pesticides. Wikipedia
7. 109 Varroa mites are arguably the biggest threat to honey bees in the United States. Wikipedia
8. 110 The rusty patched bumble bee became the first bee listed as endangered in the continental United States, in January 2017. Wikipedia
9. 111 Its numbers have declined in 87% of its historic range. Wikipedia
10. 112 It is one of about 21 bumble bee species in the eastern United States. USFWS
11. 113 The short-haired bumblebee was declared extinct in the UK in 2000; a reintroduction project in Kent began in 2009. BBCT
12. 114 The Patagonian giant bumblebee has declined since European bumblebees were brought to Chile as commercial pollinators. Wikipedia
13. 115 Forest clearance threatens Wallace's giant bee, which the IUCN lists as Vulnerable. Wikipedia
14. 116 In 2018 the EU banned the three main neonicotinoid pesticides for all outdoor uses, after a review found risks to wild bees and honeybees. Wikipedia
15. 117 Colony collapse disorder is when most of a honey bee colony's workers vanish, leaving the queen, plenty of food and a few nurse bees. Wikipedia
16. 118 The yellow-legged (Asian) hornet, which eats bees, arrived in France in about 2004 and has spread across much of Europe. Wikipedia

Garden help

1. 119 Bumblebees with long tongues prefer tubular flowers like foxgloves; short-tongued ones like the buff-tailed bumblebee use open flowers such as bramble. BBCT
2. 120 Queen bumblebees dig into soil, sometimes more than 10 cm deep, to hibernate. Log piles and undisturbed corners help them. BBCT
3. 121 Insect hotels are used as nest sites by solitary bees and solitary wasps. Wikipedia
4. 122 Ground-nesting bees dig tunnels in bare or partly vegetated, well-drained soil, so sunny bare patches help them. Xerces Society

Stings: basic safety

1. 123 The NHS says insect bites and stings are not usually serious and get better in a few days. NHS
2. 124 If a bee sting is left in the skin, the NHS advises brushing or scraping it out sideways with a fingernail or the edge of a bank card, not tweezers, then washing with soap and water. NHS
3. 125 Call 999 (or your local emergency number) if lips, mouth, throat or tongue suddenly swell, or someone is struggling to breathe after a sting. NHS
4. 126 Anaphylaxis is a life-threatening allergic reaction that happens very quickly, and insect stings can cause it. NHS

Records

1. 127 Wallace's giant bee is the world's largest bee, with a wingspan of about 63.5 mm (2.5 in). Wikipedia
2. 128 Lost to science since 1981, it was rediscovered in the North Moluccas, Indonesia, in January 2019. University of Sydney
3. 129 Perdita minima is known as the world's smallest bee, at about 2 mm long. USGS
4. 130 The Patagonian giant bumblebee is one of the largest bumblebees, with queens up to about 4 cm long. It's nicknamed the "flying mouse". Wikipedia
5. 131 Apis nigrocincta queens have the highest mating frequencies of any honey bee species. Wikipedia

Species table