03/14/2026
March is Women's History Month! 💃🏾
March 13th: Queen Bees 🐝
I know, I know. Bees aren't humans. However, as I'm reading "The Secret Life of Bees" (which isnt actually a book about bees specifically), I cant help but notice how almost every animal species, except humans, run on a matriarchal system. And reading about the bees somehow feels metaphorical...
"The queen, for her part, is the unifying force of the community; if she is removed from the hive, the workers very quickly sense her absence. After a few hours, or even less, they show unmistakable signs of queenlessness."
- Man and Insects
"New beekeepers are told that the way to find the elusive queen is by first locating her circle of attendants."
- The Queen Must Die: And Other Affairs of Bees and Men
"Honeybees are social insects and live in colonies. Each colony is a family unit, comprising a single, egg-laying female or queen and her many sterile daughters called workers. The workers cooperate in the food-gathering, nest-building and rearing the offspring. Males are reared only at the times of year when their presence is required."
- Bees of the World
"Let’s imagine for a moment that we are tiny enough to follow a bee into a hive. Usually the first thing we would have to get used to is the darkness..."
- Exploring the World of Insects
"The queen must produce some substance that attracts the workers and that can be obtained from her only by direct contact. The substance evidently stimulates the normal working behavior in the hive. The chemical messenger has been called "queen substance." Experiments have shown that the bees obtain it directly from the body of the queen."
- Man and Insects
"Honeybees depend not only on physical contact with the colony, but also require its social companionship and support. Isolate a Honeybees from her sisters and she will soon die."
- The Queen Must Die: And Other Affairs of Bees and Men
"The whole fabric of honey bee society depends on communication - on an innate ability to send and receive messages, to encode and decode information. "
- The Honey Bee
Follow along for more! 👀
