For animals, whether it is an attack or a means of defense, it is for a better life, but the bee will be pulled out together with the internal organs after the sting, which is the same as the hyena pulling out the prey, the intestines are pulled out, obviously unable to survive. However, on the surface, it is indeed somewhat unreasonable for bees to die after stinging, because if you can sting continuously like Hu Feng, which can not only play a defensive role, but also continue to work for the bee colony, wouldn't it kill two birds with one stone.
So why did bees evolve a mechanism that stings and dies, rather than stings that can be stinged multiple times? Let's explore this interesting question.
Why do bees sting?
Bees are one of the most industrious insects in the world, most of their members have an average lifespan of only about 45 days (worker bees), but from the moment of feathering, they rarely rest, during the day they have to fly in and out to collect nectar, and when they return to the hive at night, they will incite their wings to make high temperatures to "purify" honey (evaporate water), so that they can feed a bee colony, after all, the basic operation of the entire bee colony and raising offspring is the task of worker bees.
Compared with other bees, bees are more docile, even if we walk through the flowers, bees are working hard inside, usually they will not actively attack people, but when people are obviously unfavorable to them, such as wanting to catch them with their hands, or seeing the bees' hive "plotting wrong", at this time, bees will actively attack people.
Therefore, bees attacking people is actually a means of defense, not an offensive means, after all, it does not get any benefit from people, and it will kill because of it.
Why do bees die after stinging?
Bees are relatively small insects, they themselves are at the opposite bottom of the food chain, is one of the prey of many animals, coupled with their own good honey collection, which makes them have more natural enemies, so they must evolve a means of defense to survive, so the sting needle appeared.
Of course, just having a sting needle is not enough, after all, the sting needle can only cause weak damage, so the bee has evolved a poison gland connected to the sting, so that the sting needle becomes a syringe, and venom is a lethal weapon.
But when evolving this powerful defensive weapon, the bee seems to have something wrong, that is, its entire sting structure is too strange, because its sting needle has two barbed slips, the role of these two slips is to make the sting needle contract better, which allows the bee to pierce the sting needle into each other's bodies without relying on the tail muscles and pricking hard.
However, this structure has drawbacks, because when the bees pierce into each other's body, the barbs on their slip blades will be like fish hooks with barbs, difficult to pull out, when the action of stabbing and injecting venom is completed, the bees instinctively want to fly away, at this time the barbs hang in the other party's body, and under the pull, the poison sac connected to the sting needle and the digestive tract connected to the poison sac will be pulled out at once.
Such bees are severely lacking in internal organs, although they will not die immediately, but usually they are no longer able to fly back to the nest, and within a few minutes, they will gradually lose the ability to fly, fall to the ground, slowly die or be found and eaten by foragers on the ground.
In comparison, Hu Feng is different, their stings stretch by the musculature of the tail, and they do not have slips with barbs, so that they can continuously attack people and will not leave the stings in each other's bodies. In this way, it seems that Hu Feng's sting has evolved more successfully than bees, but is this really the case? The answer is no.
The stings of bees are their best evolutionary outcome
Although the stinging needle structure of bees causes them to die after stinging, why is it the best solution for them? Let's explain it from the following three perspectives:
First: increased aggression. Among the natural enemies of bees, wasps are the most threatening, so the stings of bees are basically given to wasps, although stings like wasps can be attacked many times, but wasps are originally larger than bees, and they also have teeth, which is actually their strongest weapon against bees.
The bee is relatively small, and it is difficult to pierce a wasp with a hard exoskeleton simply by the muscles of the tail, and a bee with a slippery blade can easily pierce a hole in the wasp to defeat the invading wasp, so this sting needle structure with a slip blade is actually the most favorable structure for smaller bees.
Second: it is beneficial to the ethnic group. Although on the surface, the death of bees is a decrease in the number of the population, but the reproductive ability of bees themselves is very strong (queen bee), and the rate of reproduction is completely kept up with the loss against foreign threats.
But what happens if bees sting people or other animals don't die? It should be known that when the bee inserts the sting needle under the skin of the animal, it not only injects its own venom, but also gives the body the opportunity to contact some harmful bacteria and viruses in the target's body.
Once a worker bee fights with the intruder for defense, and the invader carries some infectious pathogens, the pathogen will enter the bee body at the same time as the sting, and the worker bee will spread the pathogen to other similar species after returning to the hive, which may cause the entire hive to be destroyed.
Third: release as many pheromones as possible. After the bee sting, it will be brought out along with the poison sac and internal organs, in fact, there is another advantage, that is, to release as many pheromones as possible, and this strong pheromone, in the eyes of the same class, is a very strong signal, proving that there is an intruder, and the same kind has been sacrificed, which makes the bee colony better able to deal with the threat.
summary
The bee's sting needle is connected to the poison sac, which in turn is connected to other internal organs, and its barbed slip structure, so that they will be brought out along with the internal organs after stinging, which will cause the bee to die quickly.
Although Hu Feng's sting needle looks more "advanced" in comparison, in fact, this structure of bees is to sacrifice the small self and achieve the big self, which is the best strategy for the entire bee population. Moreover, Hu Feng's stinging needle is a hunting tool, while the bee's sting needle is a tool for defense, and the evolution mechanism of their stinging needle is also quite different.