Bees in the hive

Here are my girls! (And a few boys, but they don't do much). The only function of the male bee is to fertilize the queen, and that is only done once. The rest of the year, the male bees don't do a thing but get fed by the worker bees. They don't even have a stinger, so they can't defend the hive either.

They are a little bigger than worker bees, you can see one in the close-up I took above. It is about the fifth or sixth one from the bottom, kind of in the middle of a little cluster. Nice and fat. Sound like the good life for these male bees? Not so much. Come winter, they get kicked out. So a beekeeper knows his bees are done making honey when the male bees are out in the cold. Those poor, defenseless bachelors die in the winter! But I guess they deserve it, since they didn't do much to prepare for the cold.

I did get stung a couple more times moving the bees into the hive. One bee managed to find her way under my hood and sting me right in the throat. That hurt. I couldn't help but take off screaming, and in the process another bee took advantage of me tearing off my hood and stung me in the forehead. I guess they didn't like moving day very much.

Now I'm supposed to wait a week before I can check on them again (let them get settled in). I think I saw the queen, but I'll look harder next time, for sure.

See the grass stuffed into the entrance? That is me helping the bees defend their hive while they are a little light on numbers. Smaller entrance means less defenders necessary.