About Bees
How do bees pollinate plants?
Bees are vital in the life cycle of many plants as they help with pollination, the process of plant reproduction. Many plants depend on bees and other insect pollinators to survive.
So how does it work? Bees collect nectar and pollen from the flower of a plant. Pollen is a powdery substance that is gathered from an area of the flower called the stamen, which are the male reproductive organs. When the bee visits another flower some of the pollen rubs off and can often fall onto an area called the stigma, which are the female reproductive organs of a flower, thus fertilising the plant.
What is Honey?
As many flowers only bloom in the warmer months, it is important for bees to create a food store inside the hive for the colder months. Bees need 2 food types — nectar and pollen and worker bees have specific roles; some sourcing nectar while others source pollen.
Nectar is a complex range of sugars that provides energy for adult bees.
Pollen is an important protein source necessary for raising new bees.
Bees have glands which secrete an enzyme, known as the ‘bee enzyme’. When a bee collects the nectar, it is mixed with the enzyme in the bee’s mouth.
When the bee arrives back at the bee hive, the nectar is passed from one bee to another, further mixing the nectar with the ‘bee enzyme’, and turning the nectar into honey, which is stored in wax cells called honeycomb.
The cells are cooled by wing fanning to remove any water and when they are just right the cell is sealed with wax to make it airtight. In the winter months these cells can be opened up again to feed the colony.
As beekeepers it’s crucial to know how much honey to take from the hive without over-plundering their stores.
Types of Bee in the UK
As well as honeybees, there are around 24 species of bumblebee and over 240 species of solitary bee in the UK. Some of the most popular ones to see are:
Bumble Bees
• White-tailed bumblebee
• Buff Tailed Bumbebee
• Tree bumblebee
• Red-tailed bumblebee
SOLITARY BEES
• Common carder bee
• Red mason bee
• Tawny mining bee.
• Ashy mining bee
And just one Honey Bee (Apis Mellifera)
TREE BUMBLE BEE
(bombus hypnorum)
Little fury bees with a copper thorax, black abdomen and a white bottom.
Most favourite nesting place is your bird box and you will often see them on fruit blossom like apple
GARDEN BUMBLE BEE
(bombus hortorum)
This gorgous big bumble has a narrow head, long body with three yellow stripes and a white tail. Sometimes you wonder how they fly with such a large body and little wings. This you will see in your garden or woodlands. It has a long tongue that is great for feeding on the likes of fox gloves and honeysuckle which have tubular shaped flowers.
BUFF-TAIL BUMBLE BEE
(bombus terrestris)
If you happen to see a bumble flying about in the winter it may be this one. This is a large bumble bee with dark yellow strips from the front of the thorax and in the middle of the abdomen. The males and workers have white tails and the queen has a buff tail. With their shorter tongues they prefer open flowers like lavender, mahonia and white clover
LEAF-CUTTER BEE
(megachile species)
Facinating to watch and you can often see the female cutting a sections of leaves to build and seal their egg chambers. You can see them going into a solitary bee hotel, existing holes or cavities in your garden, somewhere nice and sunny. They feed on plants like knapweed, brambles, thistles etc and they are about the same in size to a honey bee.
RED MASON BEE
(osmia bicornis)
Another solitary bee that is ginger with a blck head and like to nest in the old morter in your brick walls or hollow plant stems. They too like holes and bee hotels but you often see them harvesting mud to seal up their nest cells where they have laid their eggs. Their will feed on many garden plants, shrubs and trees.
ASHY MINING BEE
(andrena cineraria)
These bees love sandy lawns, they dig small tunnels to make their nests. The females have a white face, a black abdomen and two sections of silver hair and the males are very similar but smaller and less noticable. Love spring flowers likefruit trees and buttercups.
For more information about Bumblebees visit The Bumblebee Conservation Trust
How to tell the difference between a honey bee and a wasp
Bees are more interested in visiting the flowers in your garden than bothering you. They are amazing to sit and watch. Always busy these little friendly flying creatures do an amazing job of pollinating and collecting nectar and pollen for the colony.
Wasps on the other hand are carnivorous and concentrate on collecting meat, such as flies, aphids, caterpillars and other invertebrates, making them an important insect-controlling predator. Adults also feed on sugars from nectar, aphid honeydew or a sugary liquid produced by their larvae. Rearing of the aphid brood finishes in the late summer and with no larvae there is no sugar, and that is when they head for our delicious food and sweet drinks.
Wasps have a slender waist, shiny smooth body, and skinny legs.
Honey Bees have a course hair all over their body and flat back legs. They are generally slightly darker in colour.
How the colony works together
How the colony of honey bees in a hive work all together is amazing. They all work together but with different roles to play. The population of the colony varies throughout the year, from around 8-10,000 over the winter months to around 50-60,000 in round about the month of July.
Spring is the most critical time for the colony. This is when it grows rapidly with the queen laying approx 2,000 eggs per day. The queen slows down laying eggs about August time and from then, through Autumn and Winter, the colony reduces in size.
In Summer worker bees work very hard and live for around 6 weeks, the first 3 weeks of their life as house bees in the hive and the last 3 weeks foraging as flying bees. July is peak month for nectar flow.
Winter bees live much longer, up to 5-6 months and are much less active. They have plenty of food and fat stores and play an essential role in the Spring with raising the new young bees to grow the colony.
Honey bees use the position of the sun to determine where they are, where they have to navigate back to, and they travel many miles in one trip out. There has been evidence that the earths magnetic field has a big role to play too in navigation.
Swarming
Swarming is the natural reproduction for bees when the Hive is getting too full. The Colony decides to divide into two, half of the workers will leave (swarm) with the existing queen, and half will stay behind. The swarming bees do not initially go far. The Bees that are left behind in the hive will have a new queen ready to emerge, some newly hatched bees and some existing bees to start again and build a new colony. Depending on the weather, swarming takes place from the months of April/May to August.
If you see a big cloud of Bees flying past you, or a ball of bees hanging on a tree or bush, then they are likely a swarm of Honey Bees. When you see them hanging around on a bush, a car, a house, in a stable or even a compost bin then they will be protecting the queen in the middle of the swarm and they are just taking a rest while the scout bees have popped off to look for a new suitable home. They will often leave in a few hours or days and are unlikely to get aggressive if left alone.
Depending on the weather from the months of April/May to August we are busy collecting and rehoming Swarms of Honey Bees.
As a beekeeper, there are signs that a hive may be about to swarm but, if managed, you can try some simple Beekeeping to control it. Other times they are just swarmy bees and no matter what they are going to leave the hive.
