When a colony accidentally loses its queen, it is said to be “queenless”. The workers realize that the queen is absent after as little as an hour, as her pheromones fade in the hive. The colony cannot survive without a fertile queen laying eggs to renew the population, so the…
All colonies are totally dependent on their queen, who is the only egg-layer. However, even the best queens live only a few years and one or two years longevity is the norm. She can choose whether or not to fertilize an egg as she lays it; if she does so,…
A colony of bees consists of three castes of bee: a queen bee, which is normally the only breeding female in the colony; a large number of female worker bees, typically 30,000–50,000 in number; a number of male drones, ranging from thousands in a strong hive in spring to very few during dearth…
Related to natural beekeeping, urban beekeeping is an attempt to revert to a less industrialized way of obtaining honey by utilizing small-scale colonies that pollinate urban gardens. Urban apiculture has undergone a renaissance in the first decade of the 21st century, and urban beekeeping is seen by many as a growing trend. Some…