Tag - bearding

A honey bee collecting water. Honey bees will fly as far as necessary to find water.

honey bee behavior

The remarkable distance honey bees actually fly

September 28, 2022

20 Comments

honey bee behavior

If your bees actually want to beard, let them

June 19, 2018

41 Comments

honey bee behavior

Bearding or swarming?

September 2, 2013

26 Comments

honey bee management • predators

Nectar dearth and summer stress

July 23, 2013

31 Comments

Bees and their queen on a honeycomb. Pixabay

honey bee behavior

The mystery of the dead drones

July 18, 2012

31 Comments

honey bee management • ventilation

Reasons why bearding is easily confused with swarming

July 26, 2010

124 Comments

Regardless of dictionaries, we have in entomology a rule for insect common names that can be followed. It says: If the insect is what the name implies, write the two words separately; otherwise run them together. Thus we have such names as house fly, blow fly, and robber fly contrasted with dragonfly, caddicefly, and butterfly, because the latter are not flies, just as an aphislion is not a lion and a silverfish is not a fish. The honey bee is an insect and is preeminently a bee; “honeybee” is equivalent to “Johnsmith.”

—From Anatomy of the Honey Bee by Robert E. Snodgrass

The non-native European Honey Bee is the state insect of:

Arkansas
Georgia
Kansas
Louisiana
Maine
Mississippi
Missouri
Nebraska
New Jersey
North Carolina
Oklahoma
South Dakota
Tennessee
Utah
Vermont
West Virginia
Wisconsin

Not one native bee is a state insect. The closest relative of a North American native bee to make the list is the Tarantula Hawk Wasp, the state insect of New Mexico.

Minnesota now has a state bee as well as a state insect. Bombus affinis, the Rusty-Patched Bumble Bee, has been so honored. Good work, Minnesota!

Connecticut’s state insect is the European “praying” mantis. Although they are beneficial insects, they are not native to North America.