Honey Bee

Apis mellifera

Summary 7

The western honey bee or European honey bee (Apis mellifera) is a species of honey bee. The genus Apis is Latin for "bee", and mellifera comes from Latin melli- "honey" and ferre "to bear"—hence the scientific name means "honey-bearing bee". The name was coined in 1758 by Carolus Linnaeus who, upon realizing the bees do not bear honey, but nectar, tried later to correct it to Apis mellifica ("honey-making bee") in a subsequent publication. However, according...

Taxon biology 8

The European honey bee, also known as the common or western honey bee (Apis mellifera) is so named because it produces large amounts of honey. It is believed that the honey bee originated in Africa and spread to northern Europe, India, and China. The honey bee is not native to North America, but was brought here with the first colonists. The honey bee is now distributed world wide.

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.

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.

Sources and Credits

  1. (c) Ferran Pestaña, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), http://www.flickr.com/photos/57956171@N00/1805417917
  2. (c) Treesha Duncan, some rights reserved (CC BY), http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8308/7894625598_88de00127e_k.jpg
  3. (c) Image:MFB.jpg Richard Bartz, Munich Makro Freak & Beemaster Hubert Seibring, Munich which gave me advice and a protection suite ;) My dog caught 6 bee-stings on the nose, i caught 4., some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a1/Apis_mellifera_carnica_worker_hive_entrance_3.jpg/460px-Apis_mellifera_carnica_worker_hive_entrance_3.jpg
  4. (c) John Baker, some rights reserved (CC BY), http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2619/3730360050_1336b71208.jpg
  5. Jan Moravec, no known copyright restrictions (public domain), https://www.biolib.cz/IMG/GAL/107467.jpg
  6. Jon Sullivan, no known copyright restrictions (public domain), https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a8/Bees_Collecting_Pollen_2004-08-14.jpg/460px-Bees_Collecting_Pollen_2004-08-14.jpg
  7. (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apis_mellifera
  8. (c) National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) at http://www.nbii.gov, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/13451158

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