Is the bumblebee the male of the honey bee?

Is the bumblebee the male of the honey bee

The bumblebee is larger than the bee, its flight is noisier, but these two animals are otherwise similar. The size of the bumblebee often leads to think that it is the male of the bee. However, this is not the case, they are two different kinds of insects.

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the bumblebee differs very little from the honey bee: it feeds on fruit nectar and collects the pollen to feed the larvae. It is therefore an important pollinator.

It is on the other hand absolutely not the male of thebee : there are bumblebee queens and sexual female workers. The term “bumblebee” has no proper definition; it designates species of flying insects larger than bees. Most often, “bourdon” designates the genus Bombusfrom the same family as bees, the apidae.

The bumblebee is larger than the drone, the male of the bee

The confusion between the bumblebee and the male bee comes from the fact that the latter is called a drone. At thehoney bee, the drone is larger in size compared to the workers, the larvae evolving in larger cells. They have no stinger, bring no pollen for the larvae and have a duration two months of life.

The bumblebees are physically different from apisby their size and hairiness. These insects are larger (they can measure up to 25 mm), are stocky and have a lot of hair. This, coupled with the fact that the insect is endothermic (able to produce its heat body), allows the bumblebee to fly from 5°C (the bee flies more from about fifteen degrees).

The social system is the same as in bees. In the spring, the queen founds a colony. She first lays workers sterile, then, at the end of the summer, males and females to ensure the descendants of the species.

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