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Older bees (mostly from 15 to 18 days old) collect nectar and pollen from the flowers of plants, bring water and adhesive resin materials into a hive. To track down honey plants and examine small objects in the shade of dwelling bees have worked out some peculiarities of eyesight. The working bee, as well as the queen bee and drone, has two compound eyes on both sides of the head. Compound eyes consist of a large number of small eyes, which perceive the image as a mosaic. Besides on the crown of bees, the queen bee and the drone there are three simple eyes. The latter serve as an addition to compound eyes to perceive the light intensity.
It was found out that bees can see the ultraviolet part of the solar spectrum (not visible to humans) very well. It is believed that the bees distinguish the following colors easily: yellow, bluish green, blue, violet and ultraviolet. According to recent data, many colors, depending on the way they reflect ultraviolet rays, seem to bees quite different in comparison with a man. Thus, blue and purple are seen by bees as four different colors. They can confuse red color with purple and black. Green and orange are seen by bees as yellow.
Bees are good at remembering the objects that resemble a dissected petals of flowers only. The flowers of melliferous plants attract insects to the nectar they emit not only by their bright color, but also by aroma. Bees have a very well-developed sense of smell. These organs are situated on the antennae of the bees. Olfaction is very important in the life of bees: due to the smell they distinguish alien bees from the bees of their colony, they search for nectar, etc.
Mouth appendages of the bees are constructed in such a way that a spoon-like tongue easily licks tiny droplets of nectar in the open flowers and extract it from a more deep corolla of flowers with the help of the proboscis formed by the lower lip and lower jaws. Bees’ proboscis has the length of 5,5-6,4 mm, and in some cases it reaches 6.9 or even 7.2 mm.
Nectar gathered by bees through the mouthparts and the esophagus gets into the bee’s crop in which the bee delivers the nectar to the hive and transmits it to young bees. In addition to nectar, bees collect pollen from plants, which is their protein food.
The body of bees is densely covered with hairs. When bees visit flowers the space between hairs accumulates a large number of pollen grains. The bees brush them off with leg brushes and place them in baskets (deepening on hind legs). When collecting pollen bees moisturize it with nectar and thus pollen grains are securely held in baskets in the form of dense globules, called pollen pellet.
Having returned to the hive with pollen pellets, bees shed lumps of pollen that they have brought into the comb cells. Young bees tamp pollen with their head immediately and when the cell is nearly full they fill it with honey up to the top. Pollen, formed in the honeycomb cells, tamped and drenched with honey, is called bee bread. It is a source of protein nutrition for the bee colony.
During nectar flow bees get sufficient quantity of water from nectar collected from flowers and brought into the hive. But if there is no natural nectar flow and the colony raises a lot of brood at this time, bees suffer from the lack of water and they are forced to bring it to the hive. Bees use propolis to polish the comb and to seal small cracks in the hive. It contains balsamic substances from shells of pollen grains, resinous substance of plants and admixture of wax.
Fourragère bees
Older bees (mostly from 15 to 18 days old) collect nectar and pollen from the flowers of plants, bring water and adhesive resin materials into a hive. To track down honey plants and examine small objects in the shade of dwelling bees have worked out some peculiarities of eyesight. The working bee, as well as the queen bee and drone, has two compound eyes on both sides of the head. Compound eyes consist of a large number of small eyes, which perceive the image as a mosaic. Besides on the crown of bees, the queen bee and the drone there are three simple eyes. The latter serve as an addition to compound eyes to perceive the light intensity.
It was found out that bees can see the ultraviolet part of the solar spectrum (not visible to humans) very well. It is believed that the bees distinguish the following colors easily: yellow, bluish green, blue, violet and ultraviolet. According to recent data, many colors, depending on the way they reflect ultraviolet rays, seem to bees quite different in comparison with a man. Thus, blue and purple are seen by bees as four different colors. They can confuse red color with purple and black. Green and orange are seen by bees as yellow.
Bees are good at remembering the objects that resemble a dissected petals of flowers only. The flowers of melliferous plants attract insects to the nectar they emit not only by their bright color, but also by aroma. Bees have a very well-developed sense of smell. These organs are situated on the antennae of the bees. Olfaction is very important in the life of bees: due to the smell they distinguish alien bees from the bees of their colony, they search for nectar, etc.
Mouth appendages of the bees are constructed in such a way that a spoon-like tongue easily licks tiny droplets of nectar in the open flowers and extract it from a more deep corolla of flowers with the help of the proboscis formed by the lower lip and lower jaws. Bees’ proboscis has the length of 5,5-6,4 mm, and in some cases it reaches 6.9 or even 7.2 mm.
Nectar gathered by bees through the mouthparts and the esophagus gets into the bee’s crop in which the bee delivers the nectar to the hive and transmits it to young bees. In addition to nectar, bees collect pollen from plants, which is their protein food.
The body of bees is densely covered with hairs. When bees visit flowers the space between hairs accumulates a large number of pollen grains. The bees brush them off with leg brushes and place them in baskets (deepening on hind legs). When collecting pollen bees moisturize it with nectar and thus pollen grains are securely held in baskets in the form of dense globules, called pollen pellet.
Having returned to the hive with pollen pellets, bees shed lumps of pollen that they have brought into the comb cells. Young bees tamp pollen with their head immediately and when the cell is nearly full they fill it with honey up to the top. Pollen, formed in the honeycomb cells, tamped and drenched with honey, is called bee bread. It is a source of protein nutrition for the bee colony.
During nectar flow bees get sufficient quantity of water from nectar collected from flowers and brought into the hive. But if there is no natural nectar flow and the colony raises a lot of brood at this time, bees suffer from the lack of water and they are forced to bring it to the hive. Bees use propolis to polish the comb and to seal small cracks in the hive. It contains balsamic substances from shells of pollen grains, resinous substance of plants and admixture of wax.
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