Bees live in large families - swarms, each in its own hive. The family includes 3 types of peculiar insects: a bee, a drone and a uterus. The question arises: "How long does a bee live?" There will not be a definite answer, first you need to clarify which one. Matriarchy reigns in the bee world. And this means that the leading role belongs to individuals of the female sex - working bees and the uterus. They form the biological basis of the family, as they are able to build a nest, collect food and multiply. Males are drones. They are unable to work. Their purpose is the fertilization of the uterus, which occurs in the air and is very rare. There is one uterus in the hive, and thousands of drones. But only a few of them mate with the uterus. Received for one breeding flight of sperm from 7-10 drones to the uterus can last for 2-3 years.
How old are bees
Each bee in the swarm system performs its specific functions and is unable to live separately, outside of the bee society. Let's start with the head of the swarm - the queen bee. It is so arranged by nature that it is the only full-fledged female with developed genital organs, the progenitor of all members of the bee family: working insects, drones, young queens. As the poet said: "40 thousand daughters live with her." The number of beehives depends on its egg production. Simple addiction: more eggs, more bees, more honey. How long does a queen bee live? Only her century is measured over the years and can be 5-6 years. But up to this age only particularly valuable specimens survive, from which they wish to receive numerous offspring. Aging, the uterus lays less and less eggs, among which more and more unfertilized, and drones are obtained from them. Most often, after 2 years, the uterus is replaced with a young one.
How long is a drone bee
It depends on how lucky an individual insect is. Drones are displayed at the end of spring. In the hive they accumulate several thousand. The drone reaches puberty by two weeks of age. Immediately after insemination of the uterus, the drone dies. Many of them also die in mating flight. Surviving bees by the end of the honey harvest, the worker bees are driven out of the hive for hunger-cold: they need too much food. But sometimes drones can still be left for the winter in those families where there is no uterus or it is infertile. Bees are able to determine the inferiority of the producer and the need for drones. A sufficient number of drones in the hive is needed in order to surely fertilize the uterus. So it turns out that some drones live 2 weeks (this can happen), others from spring to autumn cold weather, and others can live almost a year.
How much is a working beeTo answer this question, you need to know the time of birth of the worker bee when it left the cell. Spring bees that appear after wintering can live 35 days. June bees live for 30 days. But those bred during the main honey collection - 28, 30 at most. How long does an autumn bee live, say, September? In the autumn, long-lived bees appear. They need to live until spring, before the new honey season. And this in Siberia, for example, can be six months or a little more. And this is not the limit. In bee families, worker bees live for up to a year.