Interesting facts about bees. Interesting facts about bees

Everyone knows about the benefits brought by small workers - bees. Read interesting facts about bees.

All bees are excellent travelers. They unmistakably find their way back home, even flying away from it for 8 kilometers.

After the onset of the cold season, worker bees can only live for nine months.

Collecting a whole kilogram of honey requires 4500 flights of bees, during which nectar is collected from 6-10 million flowers. A large and healthy family is able to collect 10-20 kg of nectar per day, giving from 5 to 10 kg of honey.

To get just one spoon of honey (which is 30 g), 400 bees need to work hard. At the same time, one half of them collects pollen, while the other receives and processes nectar in the hive itself.

The inhabitants of Ceylon consider bees to be a delicacy eaten at dinner.

The weight of a normal bee swarm reaches 7-8 kg, and it contains 50-60 thousand bees. This bee collective has 2-3 kg of honey in its goiter. In case of inclement weather, the bees will be able to eat with a supply of honey for 8 days.

A strong family of bees during the honey collection season flies a path equal to the distance between the Earth and the Moon.

To grow a thousand larvae, you need 100 g of honey, 50 g of pollen from flowers, and 30 g of water. Each bee family needs up to 30 kg of pollen per year.

Honey is included in the diet of astronauts without fail.

Scientists have found that melittin, a toxin found in bee venom, can stop the spread of HIV in the blood. By destroying the protective shell of the HIV virus, the toxin is able to kill it. Interestingly, the poison does not harm normal cells.

Speaking of interesting facts about bees, remember that our ancestors used bees as a weapon. For example, soldiers from the army of Richard the Lionheart threw vessels with bee swarms into the besieged fortresses.

For bees, nectar from a mixture of sugars is much more attractive than nectar from a single type of sugar. Even at the same concentration.

The honeycomb cell is the most rational natural geometric shape vessel. It is interesting that the minimum amount is spent on its construction. building material– only 1.3 g of wax is required per 100 cells. The strength and capacity of such a cell is amazing.

Honey bees recognize human facial features. At the same time, the bees capture all the elements of the face - lips, eyebrows and ears. The researchers called this process "configuration processing." It is possible that this will help scientists involved in pattern recognition to develop their technologies.

A bee unloaded with nectar can reach a speed of 65 km/h.

Statistics show that Americans consume approximately 130 million kg of honey every year. According to the United States Department of Agriculture, bees pollinate 80% of agricultural crops, bringing in more than $ 20 billion annually to the country.

Interesting video about how a flock of bees fight a hornet:

Bees have five eyes. Three small eyes are at the top of the bee's head, and two large eyes are at the front.

The average flight speed of a bee is 24 km per hour.

A bee needs to travel 321,869 km to make 1 kg of honey.

Bee honey has been around for 30 million years.

The bee is single insect, which produces food that without additional processing maybe there is a person.

Honey bees are vital plant pollinators.

The wings of the bee make 11,400 times per minute, which creates their distinctive buzz.

Honey bees are almost the only bees with hairy compound eyes.

A bee pollinates from 50 to 100 flowers in one flight for honey.

Honey bees can perceive movements that take about 1/300th of a second. Humans can only see changes separated by 1/50 of a second. If the bees were watching a movie, they would see every single frame of the movie.

The sting of the bee has a notch that secures the sting in the body of the victim. The bee loses its stinger and venom pouch in the victim's body and soon dies from a ruptured abdomen.

Honey bees communicate with each other by "dancing" as they communicate direction and distance to flowers.

The average bee is actually only able to make 1/12 of a teaspoon of honey in its lifetime.

Beeswax is produced by eight paired glands on the underside of the abdomen.

Honey bees need to eat about 7-9 kg of honey to produce 450 grams of beeswax.

Honey bees are herbivores, and feed on nectar and pollen from flowers, but they are also able to devour their brood when stressed.

Bees at birth do not know how to make honey; younger bees learn this from more experienced ones.

The queen bee is the only sexual female in the hive. She lives for about 2-3 years and is the only bee that lays eggs. Her busiest time is in summer months when she lays up to 2500 eggs a day. The queen is capable of laying up to 200,000 eggs per year.

A queen bee can mate with 17 drones for 1-2 days of mating flights. The queen bee stores the sperm from these matings in her spermatheca. The queen bee is able to control the flow of sperm to fertilize her eggs when she is about to lay an egg. Honey bees have an unusual genetic sex determination system. Fertilized eggs will become female offspring while unfertilized eggs will become male. Worker bees emerge from a fertilized egg and have a complete (double) set of chromosomes.

Males, or drones, develop from unfertilized eggs and thus have only one set of chromosomes. They don't do any work, have no stinger, and are only meant for mating. Worker bees are sexually undeveloped females.

Worker bees live for about four weeks in spring or summer, and 6-8 months in winter.

The brain of a worker bee is about 1 cubic millimeter but has the densest neuropil tissue of any other animal.

Only worker bees are able to sting, and only if they feel threatened. The queen also has a sting, but they don't leave the hive.

A healthy person needs to get 500-1100 bee stings for it to be fatal. For a person who has a severe allergic reaction to bee venom, just one bee sting is enough.

A bee colony consists of 20,000-60,000 bees and one queen bee.

Each honey bee colony has its own unique scent to identify members.

Bees also drink water, so they lower the temperature of their hive so that it does not overheat in the heat.

Honeycombs are made up of hexagonal cells with walls that can support 25 times their own weight.

In winter, the bees feed on honey, which they collected during the warm season. They form a dense cluster in their hive to keep the queen and themselves warm.

Smaller species of bees often build their homes right in the soil.

Agriculture is largely dependent on the pollination of flowering plants by honey bees. Honey bees carry out up to 80% of all pollinations by all insects. Without such pollination, a significant reduction in the yield of fruits and vegetables will be noticeable.

Bees collect up to 30 kg of pollen per year per hive. Pollen from male germ cells produced by all flowering plants for plant fertilization and embryo formation. Bees use pollen as food. Pollen is one of the richest and purest natural products containing up to 35% protein, 10% sugar, carbohydrates, enzymes, minerals and vitamins (carotene), B1 (thiamine), B2 (riboflavin), B3 (nicotinic acid), B5 ( panothenic acid), C (ascorbic acid), H (biotin) and R (rutin).

Honey is used by bees for food during all year round. There are many types and flavors of honey, depending on its source of nectar. Bees make honey from the nectar they collect from flowering trees and plants. Honey is easily digestible, pure food. Honey is hygroscopic and has antibacterial properties. Eating local honey can help get rid of allergies.

Secreted from special glands, beeswax is used by bees to build honeycombs. It is also used by humans to make medicines, cosmetics, art supplies, furniture polishes, and candle making.

Propolis (a sticky resin) collected from trees by bees is mixed with wax to make a special glue. Bees use it to seal cracks and repair their hive. People use it in the field of health care, as well as the basis for a thin varnish for wood.

Bee venom treatment is widely practiced abroad and in our country to solve health problems and treat diseases such as arthritis, neuralgia, high blood pressure, high level cholesterol.

Honey bees are not native to the US. They are "Europeans" in origin, and were brought to North America the first settlers.

Honey bees are not aggressive by nature and will not sting just like that. They do this to protect their hive.

The practice of collecting honey and beekeeping has its roots in the Stone Age, as evidenced by the cave paintings.

Honey is the only food that contains all the substances needed to sustain life, including enzymes, vitamins, minerals and water. It is also a unique food that contains pinocembrin, an antioxidant associated with improved brain function.

Honey bees have 6 legs, 2 compound eyes made up of thousands of tiny lenses (one on each side of the head), 3 simple eyes on the top of the head, 2 pairs of wings, a nectar bag, and a stomach.

Honey bees have 170 odorant receptors, compared to 62 in fruit flies and 79 in mosquitoes. Their exceptional olfactory ability includes receiving signals from the hive, social connections inside the hive, and scent recognition to search for food. Their sense of smell is so precise that she can distinguish hundreds of different flower varieties and determine if a flower contains pollen or nectar from a distance of several meters.

The brain of a bee is oval and comparable to the size of a single sesame seed, but it has a remarkable ability to learn and remember things, and can also do complex calculations.

The queen bee can live up to 5 years and is the only bee that lays eggs.

Bees from one swarm can "steal" honey from other hives. If they manage to kill the queen, then they lure the rest of the bees into their hive and they meekly fly to a new place of residence.

There is only one that hunts bees for food. This is a common tit. Particularly active eating of bees by these birds is noted in the early spring, when other types of "food" are not yet available.

Convent in honor of the icon Mother of God"Joy and Consolation" in the village of Velyka Olshanka in the Kiev region has been operating since 2008 as a courtyard of the Kyiv Trinity Ioninsky Monastery. Under the leadership of the confessor and builder, Bishop of Obukhovsky, Jonah, the monastery is being built in the Byzantine style. All architectural features Olshansky monastery complex have real prototypes on Mount Athos.

Facts about bees

1. A bee lives for about a month

During the honey season, the insect works without sparing himself, for wear and tear. Because her life is so short: a maximum of 45 days.

If a bee hibernates and does not fly anywhere, then it lives for six months - practically from the end of the season (in early October) to the start of a new one (in March).

2. Each bee colony has its own special honey.

In each hive, there are special scout bees. With the onset of heat, they fly out to study the situation, choose certain areas to collect nectar, where other hard workers then fly, following the "instructions" of these trusted persons.

Different bee colonies have different interests. Someone prefers buckwheat color, someone - fruit trees, to someone - something else, and to someone a little bit of everything. As a result, each hive produces unique honey, even if the apiary is located in one place.

beekeeper nuns

3. A bee can travel up to 60 kilometers in a day

The bee extracts nectar within a radius of 2-3 km from the hive. Finds what she needs, loads herself "to the eyeballs" and carries the prey to her house. A worker can make up to 10 such sorties per day.

4. Everything from bee products is useful. Even ... the bees themselves!

It is known that in the "assortment" of producers there is not only honey. There's also pollen, bee bread, royal jelly, honeycombs, wax, propolis, and even the bees themselves! Dead bees - from insects that have become obsolete, dried in a special way - have anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory and many other properties, help stabilize blood pressure, metabolism, heart and kidney function. It is used in dry form, tinctures, ointments and other medicines are made on its basis.

Even the air around the hives, bee sounds and smells are useful. In order to get this benefit, special houses are built over the hives - sun loungers. You can climb into a sunbed, "rest" for a couple of hours for medicinal purposes and improve your health even better than in overseas resorts.

5. The hive consists almost entirely of "women" bees who live in a large friendly family.

Drones - bees of the opposite sex - are needed by the bee family at rare moments. In particular, in order for the new owner of the evidence to appear - the uterus. For the winter, if the drones themselves do not want to fly away, the bees drive them out. Drones are large, they eat a lot, but they do not bring any benefits in winter.

It is interesting that the bees clearly remember the trajectory of their flight, the area and remain faithful to their family and home until the end of their small lives. But it happens that they deliberately leave the hive - they swarm. When, for example, the family becomes cramped, but they are not “expanded” and not resettled; when the head - the uterus - is old, sick, or simply does not fulfill its functions; when the bees have no work to do, they have nothing to collect, they start to “goof off and swarm as a result. For all these and other factors, the beekeeper must monitor carefully and prevent swarming in time.

By the way, last year, as a result of swarming, some family flew away from their owners and flew to our Olshansky apiary. For the homeless, they quickly put together a new shelter and settled in it. And this year, some family itself flew into an empty hive, without waiting for an invitation.

The beekeeper must monitor the hives and prevent swarming in time

Facts about honey

1. Candied honey is not spoiled at all.

Sugaring is a natural process of honey crystallization. There is nothing wrong with this, the sweet product does not lose its natural properties, on the contrary, it even improves them. Only liquid acacia honey is not candied.

2. Not all honey is taken from bees

Defenders of the rights of insects can be calm: the honey necessary for the life of the bees is left to its creators. About 20% of honey is stored in the hive for the winter.

3. Honey is a completely natural product

There is no artificial sugar in real honey. Yes, before the end of the season, striped workers are given additional doping - sugar syrup, so that they can better endure the winter and save their strength. But until spring, they drink it completely. The "bread" for bees is perga - pollen collected from flowers.

4. Not every flower makes honey.

It is little known that, for example, the color of linden is of interest to a bee only when the air temperature at night is 18 degrees. If more or less, the nectar in the linden does not stand out, and the bee simply flies by. Because, for example, last year there was no linden honey.

5. Honey is "born" only in purity

When the honey season comes, the bees do not immediately go hunting. Only after they remove it from their hive. During the long winter (you can imagine!) a lot of various garbage. Including the dead sea we mentioned.

A bee will not carry nectar into a dirty hive, therefore, in order to start collecting honey as soon as possible, as soon as the air temperature is at least 15 degrees, the beekeeper must inspect the bee apartments and help the wards clean up.

The secret of all beekeepers

It is simple: trust in the Providence of God. Each new honey season for beekeepers, especially beginners like us, is full of discoveries and surprises. What will the weather be like? Will anything bloom? Will the bees swarm? Will they be able to collect something? Will there be honey at all? Everything is in the hands of the Lord.

This year, due to the cold at the beginning of the honey-bearing period, the bees had nothing to collect, so in the vicinity some beekeepers did not have honey at all, someone collected, but not enough. By the grace of God, we have a sweet harvest even more than last season - about 230 liters. Thank God for everything!

Why consecrate honey?

Why honey is consecrated in churches on August 14, why it is done and what it gives, comments the rector of the Archangel-Michael Church in the village of Volosskoe, Dnepropetrovsk region, priest Andrei Pinchuk.

We always pray for the things that are most valuable to us. And since ancient times, people have carried to the temple what is of great importance to them in order to sanctify, receive a blessing.

Honey in this respect, and indeed all beekeeping products, are unique. Honey is food. Honey is a drink - drinks made on its basis. This health - medicines from bee products. This is the light wax candles. Name at least one product that would fit all of these categories at once.

Let's imagine what would happen if you remove honey from life ancient christian. This is the same as being left without sugar and its derivatives, without electricity and pharmacies today. So let's think now why our ancestors treated honey so carefully and reverently.

Why bless honey?

And why do people consecrate anything at all? Since ancient times, the annual cycle of worship has been closely associated with agricultural work, because Christians sought to sanctify all stages of their work on earth. Hives and wells, seeds and fields were consecrated. Consecrated, respectively, and the harvest. The first fruits, as it was called, were brought to the church - for sprinkling with holy water, giving thanks to God. Part was left for the temple, the rest people carried home. After all, each of us, leaving the temple, carries within himself holiness. And we try to spread this holiness to what surrounds us - to the family, community, work, and so on.

After consecration in the temple, honey does not change its properties. Everything sanctified generally benefits only the person who perceives it reverently. And who doesn’t care, he can even pour holy water on himself in centners or have consecrated honey in kilograms, nothing will change for him.

Prepared by Julia Kominko
Photo: nun Nektaria (Tereshchenko)

Very useful insects that pollinate plants and flowers, giving us tasty and useful product entitled honey. But few people know that bees can, for example, recognize people's faces.

About this and more many interesting facts and will be discussed further.

bee venom

A bee venom toxin called melittin maybe prevent spread of HIV in the blood. Melittin might even kill HIV, piercing the protective shell of this virus. At the same time, the poison does not harm normal cells, leaving them unharmed.

Scientists in St. Louis, USA hope the toxin can be used as a preventive measure.

Bee venom can also ease the pain caused by rheumatoid arthritis. Researchers at the University of São Paulo, Brazil found that the molecules found in bee venom increase glucocorticoids in the body (anti-inflammatory hormone).

The bees work hard

After the arrival of cold weather, worker bees can live for up to nine months.

But in the summer they rarely live longer than six weeks. During this period of the year, the bees literally work to exhaustion.

A certain job for the bee

Each bee clearly performs only its specific duties. scout bees looking for new sources of food. soldier bees, which scientists only discovered in 2012 have been working as security guards all their lives. There are also funeral bees, responsible for cleaning the hive from dead bees.

But there are also the most amazing individuals who can change their jobs throughout their lives. At the same time, there are chemical changes in their brain.

bee brain

When the process of aging of the whole organism begins in bees, their brain avoids this. In fact, their brains develop in the opposite direction. Imagine that you are riding a bike that makes you feel younger and younger.

Some scientists believe this discovery will help us slow down onset of dementia.

healing hives

Bees use resin to strengthen their hive. poplars and an evergreen tree called propolis. Propolis is a kind glue for the hive.

Although bees use it to store honey, but people to fight bacteria, viruses and fungi.

Studies show that propolis taken from the beehive can treat:

Herpes.
Stomatitis.
Angina.
Eczema.

Bees recognize faces

Honey bees are capable of recognize facial features of people. They see all the outlines of the face: eyebrows, lips and ears. It's called "configuration processing" which is hoped to help computer scientists improve technology face recognition.

Bees are individual

Even in hives, there are honest bees and truant bees. Researchers at the University of Illinois found that Not all bees are interchangeable at work.

Some bees are thrill seekers. Others have a timid demeanor. In 2011, through research, they discovered that bees can be pessimists, thus proving that to some extent they can even have the senses.

Bees enjoy caffeine and cocaine

Nature created caffeine not for enjoyment. In fact, it protects plants by driving away harmful insects away, and attracts pollinators to itself.

Scientists from the University of Newcastle found that caffeinated nectar helps bees recall, where the flower is, increasing the chances of a return visit.

While caffeine makes bees perform better, cocaine makes them real liars.

Honey bees, upon returning to the hive, announce the nectarine hot spots to others through dance. So scientists observed such bees, having previously applied cocaine to their backs. After that, the bees performed their communication dances, in essence, not having this right, thereby deceiving others.

By studying this behavior of buzzing insects, scientists want to better understand the disease of drug addiction.

bees like vikings

Bees use the sun as compass. But when it's cloudy, they navigate by polarized light, using special photoreceptors to discern where the sun is in the sky.

The Vikings may have used a similar system: in sunny days their navigation worked with a sundial, but with cloudy weather "sun stones"(pieces of calcite), which act like a Polaroid camera, helped them stay on course.

Bees are mathematicians

Imagine that you need to do some errands. For example, you have to visit six stores, and they are all in six different places. How to calculate the shortest distance by visiting all six places? Mathematicians call it "traveling salesman problem" and when solving it, they can even involve a computer.