Beekeeping Biology
There is only one of these types of bees in a colony. Hint: She lays all of the eggs.
What is a queen bee?
This kind of bee is what is kept for the agricultural production of honey.
What is the European Honey Bee?
This is associated with what is considered to be the food and drink of the Gods because it never spoils.
What is honey?
True
This popular brand was started by a beekeeper and his neighbor who made candles out of his wax. They then expanded to a line of products including cosmetics.
What is Burt's Bees?
A queen mates with this many drones during her single mating flight.
What is 12-16?
Bama Bee Club harvested this many gallons of honey this August.
What is 6-7 gallons?
In viking ceremonies, a married couple drank this alcoholic drink for good luck.
What is mead? (also accept honey wine)
These fuzzy bees, native to the US, are eusocial (meaning they live in colonies).
What are bumble bees?
A bee lives this long in the summer.
This is how long the egg-hatching cycle is for a worker bee larvae. (In days)
How long is 21 days?
This type of honey has psychedelic effects similar to being drunk or tripping. It is specifically found in countries like Nepal and Turkey.
This president (pictured on Mount Vernon) kept bees on his estate.
Who is George Washington? (Bees are kept at Mount Vernon now)
These bees are named for the way they burrow into wood to build their individual nests (solitary bees). (Hint: we see many of these in the adobe hut at the Arboretum)
What are carpenter bees?
This beekeeping tool helps break up the alert pheromones of bees, helping to calm them.
What is a smoker?
This kind of bee has only a half set of chromosomes (16), coming from only an unfertilized egg.
What is a drone?
Honey needs to be below this moisture content to safely store without fermentation. (In a percentage)
What is 17%?
This type of bee was kept by Ancient Maya peoples who celebrated the "bee god", Ah Mucan Cab.
What are stingless bees?
There are this many different species of bees in North America.
What is more than 3600?
This is the pollen that bees stick to their legs to store while the return back to the colony.
What are pollen pants?
This substance comes out of worker bees foreheads & changes the development of larvae to make queens.
What is royal jelly?
Bees use this enzyme to break down sucrose into fructose and glucose in their honey.
What is invertase?
This Celtic tradition was said to help spread news of deaths, marriages, and births. (It would be bad luck to not inform the bees of these changes.)
What is "Telling the Bees"?
This amount of native species are pollen specialists, meaning that they use only pollen from one species (or genus) of plants. (If that plant is removed, the bee goes away. If bees are removed, the plant doesn't reproduce. Some of the native bees are specialists on the very plants that we use for food, including squashes, pumpkins, gourds, and the annual sunflower.) (In a percentage. Will accept answers inside a range.)
What are 20-40% of native bees?
This insect pest that lives in a beehive that can spread disease and take honey. (Hint: I call the the bee equivalent of rats)
What are hive beetles?