Life Stages of Honeybees
Activity
It may help you to organize your notes in a chart. Write this chart in your exercise book and then add the information as you discuss it in class.
Chart of the Time Each Kind of Bee Spends at Each Life Stage
| Kind of Honeybee | 1). Egg open brood | 2). Larva open brood | 3.) Pupa capped brood | 4.) Adult Life span |
| Queen |
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| Worker |
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| Drone |
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A honeybee has 4 life stages. Each life stage is very different from the others
Egg:
The first life stage is the egg. It looks like a tiny, white stick or small grain of rice. The queen lays one egg in the bottom of a cell. It is very hard to see eggs. You need to tip the frame into the sun before you can see them. It is important for a beekeeper to know what eggs look like because that is sometimes the easiest way to know if there is a laying queen in the hive. The egg hatches after 3 days.
The queen can lay 2 kinds of eggs, fertilized eggs and unfertilised eggs. When the queen lays an unfertilised egg, it becomes a drone. When a queen lays a fertilized egg it becomes a worker or a queen. If it is fed only royal jelly, it will be a queen. If it is fed a little bit of royal jelly and mainly beebread, it will be a worker.
Preknowledge: Interesting Fact
The larva stage lasts for only 6 days, but the larva increases its weight 1500 times.
Larva:
The egg hatches into a tiny white worm. This is the larva. It looks like a tiny letter c in the bottom of the cell. As soon as it hatches the nurse bees begin to feed it a small amount of royal jelly. This food looks like a creamy white liquid and you can sometimes see the tiny larva floating on it. If the larva has hatched from an unfertilised egg, it will be a drone. These larva are then fed beebread (a mixture of honey and pollen). If the larva has hatched from a fertilized egg, it will become a worker or a queen. If the larva is going to be a worker bee the workers feed it a small amount of royal jelly and then feed it beebread. Larvae that are going to be queens are fed ONLY royal jelly. Royal jelly is a very special food that makes the pupa develop into a queen. The larva eats 24 hours a day. It grows very fast and increases its body weight 5 ½ times in the first day. After 6 days it is a fat white worm that completely fills the cell. Then the workers cover or cap the cell with wax. It is now called capped brood.
You can tell what kind of bee is inside a capped cell by what the cell looks like. Capped worker brood is flat and even. It is the kind of capped brood that you see most often in a hive. Capped drone brood is raised and looks like bumps on the comb. It is often near the bottom of a frame. A capped queen cell hangs down and looks like a peanut. You usually find only a few capped queen cells in the middle of the frames. If you see queen cells hanging near the bottom of the frame they are special ones called swarm cells. You will learn about swarm cells in topic 12.
Pupa:
Once the cell is capped, the larva stops eating. It begins to make a cocoon (sac or bag) for itself. When the cocoon is finished, the larva starts the resting stage. It is called a pupa. The pupa stage lasts for 7 days for a queen, 12 days for a worker, and 15 days for a drone. During this time the body of the pupa begins to change. It starts to look more and more like an adult. When the change is finished, the pupa has become an adult. It stops resting and begins to chew away the cap. It emerges from the cell as an adult. It is born.
Adult:
When the young bee emerges from the cell, it is fully formed. It has all of the characteristics (body parts) of an older bee. It looks a bit smaller, grey or whitish, and its wings look small, folded, and unused.
Activity: Time line
To help you learn the life stages of honeybees draw the following time line in your exercise books. Fill in the important events for the days in the development of the honeybees as you discussed in class.
Timeline
Activity: Sorting Game
Activity: Beehive Demonstration
- Go to the beehives and in pairs or small groups, open the hives and find and identify the 4 life stages of the bees. Note: If you cannot find all life stages in the hive you are looking in, make sure that you see them in another student’s hive or at another time. Eggs are very small and hard to see but it is very important that you are able to find them. When you see eggs in your hive you will know that the queen is healthy and laying eggs. You will be able to split a hive (topic 13) properly when you can identify eggs.
- Find a frame with eggs and take turns holding the frame yourself, tipping it into the sunlight until you spot the eggs. If you have trouble finding eggs, look for a frame of open brood. The older brood is usually in the centre of the frame. As you look out toward the edges of the frame the larva should get smaller as they are younger. Once you find young larva (a tiny letter ”c” shape) then eggs should be in nearby cells. It takes practise. Also, keep your eyes open for the queen. She is usually near open brood, especially eggs. She is always exciting to find. Be sure to handle frames of open brood carefully. Hold them over the hive as the queen may be on the frame and might fall off.
- Try and find an emerging (being born) adult bee. On a frame of old capped brood (a frame that has capped brood around the outside of the frame with open cells in the middle) look for young bees starting to chew their way out of a cell. Try to find young (newly emerged) worker bees. They will be smaller and grey, and their wings will look small and folded.
- Try and find the 3 kinds of capped brood. Note: Capped drone brood and queen cells are not always present in all hives. Make sure you know the difference between capped worker and capped drone brood. If possible try and find a queen cell. There are usually a few uncapped queen cells along the bottom bar of brood frames.