Worker
HIERARCHY OF HONEYBEES PLAYS A VITAL ROLE IN FOOD
One out of every three bites of food people consume exists because of pollinators, including honeybees. A single beehive contains a sophisticated ecosystem of as many as 80,000 insects, each with a specific job to help create and maintain the colony. “There’s a hierarchy of bees within the hive,” explained Steve Hays, instructor of the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office Second Chance Beekeeping program and a retired deputy and hobbyist beekeeper. “In each beehive, there are three types of bees: a single queen, drones and workers. A drone’s sole purpose is reproduction and the worker bees tend to the queen, which lays eggs.” The hive is dominated by the queen bee, which emits pheromones that regulate hive activity. Worker bees have many roles, Hays said, such as hive cleaning and repair, nursing brood (caring for the eggs, larvae and pupae), attending to the queen, foraging for food and water, creating and storing honey and guarding the hive. Hays said he enjoys combining his love of beekeeping with a longtime career in law enforcement: “If I can make a difference to one offender at the jail through beekeeping, that is my reward.”
Drone
Queen
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