When we think of a bee, we immediately think of buzzing bees hunting for nectar on a hot summer afternoon. We like to label a busy person as a little busy bee. But how do the bees determine who does what in the hive? Some are nurses, taking care of the brood, others...
Bzzz to Brr…?
Where do bees go during winter? Do they die out or go to warmer climates? When summer ends and the busy nectar-collecting bees disappear, what happens to them? While some species of bees go into hibernation or die off completely with only the queen re-emerging in...
Plants to attract bees
At Simply Bee we love our little honey-makers and from research we can all agree that bees are important to our survival as humans. Did you know that you can help the bees by making sure your garden is bee-friendly? There are several things that attract a bee nl....
Life cycle of the honey bee
The lifecycle of a honey bee consists of three main stages: the larval, pupal, and adult stages. Within a normal hive situation, a single queen bee lays fertilized and unfertilized eggs. Fertilized eggs can hatch worker and queen bees, unfertilized eggs hatch drone...
Busy bees need sleep too…!
Wait...? What? Do bees sleep, do they sleep at night, and if so, where and how do we know they are sleeping? As one of the most studied creatures on the planet, it’s no surprise that scientists have asked many questions, including “do bees sleep?” First, some simple...
WATCH: Bees Hatching
Take a look at this fascinating time-lapse of a honey bee hatching. Unlike a bumble bee colony or a paper wasp colony, the life of a honey bee colony is perennial. The three types of honey bees in a hive are: queens (egg-producers), workers (non-reproducing females),...
Similarities in bee and human brains
A new study from the University of Otago and the university of Heidelberg has found a link between activity in the brain of bees and humans. The team found that the alpha oscillations in bees have similar properties to the human brain. Alpha oscillations are...
Can bees do maths? Yes – they can!
The humble honeybee can use symbols to perform basic maths including addition and subtraction, shows new research published today in the journal Science Advances. Despite having a brain containing less than one million neurons, the honeybee has recently shown it can...
World seeing ‘catastrophic collapse’ of insects.
Nearly half of all insect species worldwide are in rapid decline and a third could disappear altogether, according to a study warning of dire consequences for crop pollination and natural food chains. "Unless we change our way of producing food, insects as a whole...
Breaking new ground by tracking pollen from A to Bee
Cape Town – Pollination biologist from Stellenbosch University Dr Corneile Minnaar is breaking new ground in a field of research that has been hampered by a lack of a universal method to track pollen for more than a century. Despite more than 200 years of detailed...