We all know that the animal world is full of magic, many of which seem incomprehensible to us, such as the "tigress" that we often hear about in our lives, and many people seem to be fierce. It is true that in the animal world, the tigress is indeed very fierce, to a certain extent, more fierce than the male tiger, but we have to admit the gentle side of the tigress.
As the saying goes, "the female is weak, for the mother is just", this sentence is used to describe the tigress is really very suitable, the tigress will only produce a cub once in about 3 years, not that it can not produce a cub, but after each cub to bring her cub into an "adult", in this process, the tigress will teach the cub to hunt and survive, and wait until the cub can survive independently will be in heat for the second time, and this time, generally 2 to 3 years.
You know, the life span of the tiger is only about 20 to 25 years, it can be said that a lifetime, the tigress really gave time to her offspring, compared to the male tiger who will only "sow" everywhere, the tigress can really be said to be a good wife and mother.
The world of bees is also full of magic, we all know that bees will breed a very special batch of age-appropriate wintering bees before winter, the life of this group of bees will be longer than the life of normal worker bees, according to current research, the longest life of age-appropriate wintering bees can reach more than 5 times the life of normal worker bees.
Although the life span of the age-appropriate wintering bees is very long, the age-appropriate wintering bees are actually a very sad group, after going through hardships to support a colony, even the last breath is not wasted, it is indeed touching. We all know that after the bees overwinter, the age-appropriate wintering bees and the new bees have a work "handover" process, that is, the alternating period of the age-appropriate wintering bees, so how is this process realized? Let's take a closer look at it today.
Breeding of age-appropriate wintering bees
Because the bees do not collect honey in winter, the queen bee does not lay eggs, and does not hibernate, if you want the bee colony to survive the winter safely, you need the bees to live longer, because the overwintering bees are mainly worker bees, and the life of the worker bees is usually only one or two months, and the winter may reach more than half a year, which is a contradiction.
In order to make the lifespan of bees more than half a year, a group of bees that have not collected honey and fed larvae will be bred in the colony every year, and the lifespan of these bees can exceed half a year, and these bees are called age-appropriate wintering bees in bee farming.
How miserable is it for an age-appropriate wintering bee to overwinter?
As an age-appropriate wintering bee, winter time can not die, if the age of wintering bees die in winter, it will lead to the spring when the bees have been extinguished, so in winter, the age-appropriate wintering bees to ensure a large amount of honey to increase metabolism to produce heat, while the entire winter if there is no good weather will not be excreted, a large amount of feces accumulate in the belly of the bee, the weight can reach half of the bee's body weight, if the quality of honey is not good, many bees will be suffocated in the winter.
Spring blooms begin to feed the next generation
In the spring, the weather warms, under the feeding of beekeepers, the queen bee resumes spawning, these waiting for several months, or even more than half a year of age wintering bees, finally excrete the feces, and then begin to feed the bee larvae, due to poor physical fitness, these worker bees are usually difficult to feed a larvae, and the weak group or even 3 wintering bees can feed a larva.
Wintering bees alternate
Bee larvae out of the house, about 20 days or so a batch, when the new bees in the swarm began to increase, the number of age-appropriate wintering bees began to slowly decrease, when the number of new bees in the bee colony reached the overwintering period of the swarm, the age-appropriate wintering bees completed the work of the alternation, at this time, the bee colony may not have the age of the wintering bees, but many friends may not know, these age-appropriate wintering bees finally died.
In fact, as the age-appropriate wintering bee, the life span is already very special, we can regard this time of wintering as the time of the age-appropriate wintering bee superfluous time, the real life expectancy is actually from the time after the house, to the spring breeding time is normal, so the age-appropriate wintering bee has also experienced the work of a normal bee, that is to say, the age-appropriate wintering bee between death, experienced the work of guarding the bees, the work of collecting bees, the work of detecting bees, the work of collecting water peaks, the work of stealing bees, until death, It can be said that for the development of the bee colony, the last breath is not wasted, is it not great?