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Bee

Bees are winged insects closely related to wasps and ants that are known for pollination and honey production. There are over 20,000 known bee species across seven families, with some like honey bees living socially in colonies while most (over 90%) like mason bees are solitary. Bees are found everywhere except Antarctica and range in size from less than 2mm to 39mm, feeding on nectar and pollen. Bee pollination is important both ecologically and commercially, though wild bee populations have declined. Beekeeping has been practiced for millennia in places like Ancient Egypt, Greece, and by the Mayans in pre-Columbian times.

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29 views1 page

Bee

Bees are winged insects closely related to wasps and ants that are known for pollination and honey production. There are over 20,000 known bee species across seven families, with some like honey bees living socially in colonies while most (over 90%) like mason bees are solitary. Bees are found everywhere except Antarctica and range in size from less than 2mm to 39mm, feeding on nectar and pollen. Bee pollination is important both ecologically and commercially, though wild bee populations have declined. Beekeeping has been practiced for millennia in places like Ancient Egypt, Greece, and by the Mayans in pre-Columbian times.

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hannaslominska.2008
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© © All Rights Reserved
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Bees are winged insects closely related to wasps and ants, known for their roles in pollination and,

in the
case of the best-known bee species, the western honey bee, for producing honey. Bees are a
monophyletic lineage within the superfamily Apoidea. They are currently considered a clade, called
Anthophila.[1] There are over 20,000 known species of bees in seven recognized biological families.[2][3]
[4] Some species – including honey bees, bumblebees, and stingless bees – live socially in colonies while
most species (>90%) – including mason bees, carpenter bees, leafcutter bees, and sweat bees – are
solitary.

Bees are found on every continent except Antarctica, in every habitat on the planet that contains insect-
pollinated flowering plants. The most common bees in the Northern Hemisphere are the Halictidae, or
sweat bees, but they are small and often mistaken for wasps or flies. Bees range in size from tiny
stingless bee species, whose workers are less than 2 millimetres (0.08 in) long,[5] to Megachile pluto, the
largest species of leafcutter bee, whose females can attain a length of 39 millimetres (1.54 in).

Bees feed on nectar and pollen, the former primarily as an energy source and the latter primarily for
protein and other nutrients. Most pollen is used as food for their larvae. Vertebrate predators of bees
include primates and birds such as bee-eaters; insect predators include beewolves and dragonflies.

Bee pollination is important both ecologically and commercially, and the decline in wild bees has
increased the value of pollination by commercially managed hives of honey bees. The analysis of 353
wild bee and hoverfly species across Britain from 1980 to 2013 found the insects have been lost from a
quarter of the places they inhabited in 1980.[6]

Human beekeeping or apiculture (meliponiculture for stingless bees) has been practised for millennia,
since at least the times of Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece. Bees have appeared in mythology and
folklore, through all phases of art and literature from ancient times to the present day, although
primarily focused in the Northern Hemisphere where beekeeping is far more common. In Mesoamerica,
the Mayans have practiced large-scale intensive meliponiculture since pre-Columbian times.[5]

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