Life inside the hive…The Queen Bee

This is a story of a single ruler. A remarkable queen, born into royalty with a single

purpose…to unify and ensure the survival of her kingdom and her species.

The Old Queen was nearing the end of her life. The sisterhood could sense it. They knew it

was time for renewal.

The Old Queen was failing. She was tired. She kept her colony alive, unified and strong,

but now it was time to lay down the reigns. But who will be the new queen? Where would

she come from?

Like anything else in life, even queen honey bees don’t live forever. Queen honey bees

only live for about 3 – 5 years and then they are superseded by a new queen.

It was now up to the colony to make sure that a new queen takes over the reign from the

Old Queen. They need a strong, agile queen. One that can take them into the future.

It all starts with a single egg. An egg laid by her mother and specially picked by the

sisterhood in her colony. The sisterhood starts to search within the hive.

They select a couple of fertilized eggs or larvae that is between 1 and 3 days old. One of them is

destined to rule this kingdom. This new queen will have to battle her way to the throne. It

won’t come easy. But the one that reigns supreme will be the ultimate monarch!

They start to feed the selected larvae with royal jelly, a highly nutritious, protein - rich

substance, produced from glands on the heads of the house bees. As the larvae grows,

the house bees enlarge the cells. Since the new queen will be much larger, she will need

all the space to grow. The cells will develop into “Peanut shell shaped” structures and are

referred to as “Queen Cells”.

Nine days have passed since the eggs were laid. It is now time for the queen cells to be

capped (closed). The house bees get to work and each queen cell is now capped and

sealed off. Now the waiting starts. Inside the cells, the queen larvae begin to the spin a

cocoon. The new queen is going through a remarkable transformation. She will now

pupate. It is around 16 days after her mother laid the egg. The new queen has completed

her transformation and is ready to emerge as a new virgin honey bee queen.

One more check in the mirror! She is ready. She starts to chew through the wax capping

at the tip of her cell. Her first task will be a hard one… she will need to kill every other

potential rival to the throne. She needs to find the other queen cells. And quickly, before

they emerge.

As she finds them, she stings her rivals to death inside their queen cells. There can only

be one! And it will be her. With her rise to the throne the Old Queen dwindles silently

away, leaving her daughter the kingdom of gold. There is much to do for the new queen.

But she needs a couple of days to mature. Find her feet around the castle, you might say.

What awaits her is the biggest challenge she will face during her reign as queen bee. Her

mating flights. If she does not succeed in successfully mating with a male, she will fail her

colony. Her kingdom’s future depends on her mating and returning to the hive. Alive!

She has to do this alone. She will have to face the brutality of nature all on her own.

It is about a week after she emerged from her cell. She leaves the hive alone. Her wings

carrying her high into the sky. She needs to be strong. Vigilant. And she needs to find

where the drones congregate. If she can find them, her courtship will be an adventurous

dance in the air, where the drones will try to win her heart. She will mate with multiple

drones about 6m high in the air!

And as she makes it back, so begins a new era in the life of this kingdom. A new future

has been paved.

She is the sole ruler. The future. She is the Queen Honey Bee.