Bee of the week - the Honey bee🐝
There is just one species of honeybee in the UK. You can identify it by its slim, sandy thorax and black abdomen with golden amber bands.
Honeybees have been domesticated for centuries and it's rare to find a truly wild colony. Our honeybees mostly live in hives of up to 20,000 bees and are commonly found feeding on open flowers that can easily be reached with their short tongues.
Honey bee's pollinate around a third of all the food crops we eat and so are extremely important! A colony can have up to 60,000 bees🐝🐝and they can fly at 15-20 miles per hour.
A Worker bee can visit up to 2,000 flowers per day🌺🌸 typically visiting 50-100 flowers before heading home - then repeating the process again and again!
Wildflowers play a very important role in the Honey bee's life - providing vital pollen for these buzzy little creatures! 🐝🐝