how do bees keep cool?
Question by ghost nation: how do bees keep cool?
in this hot weather , with their little fur coats on ?
What do you think? Answer below!
8 Responses to how do bees keep cool?
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Question by ghost nation: how do bees keep cool?
in this hot weather , with their little fur coats on ?
What do you think? Answer below!
By having a little dip in the honey……
Bob
January 15, 2014 at 8:24 pm
I would imagine both the speed they do and the fast repitition of their wings would keep them cool!
victory
January 15, 2014 at 9:02 pm
At the entrance to the hive worker bees stand and fan their wings to circulate air inside the hive
chaoslover
January 15, 2014 at 9:29 pm
They dip themselves into their Bee Kool-Aid® pitcher inside their beehive. It’s never been photographed or filmed.
Canseco's Mussel
January 15, 2014 at 9:31 pm
They actually use their wings as fans! Bees will station themselves near the entrance of the hive and ‘fan’ with their wings to create a breeze which will lower the inside temp. in the hive.
Temperature regulation (bumblebees are warm-blooded insects)
Bumblebees often fly in air temperatures as low as 10oC or lower, yet they cannot take off unless their flight muscles are above 30oC, and the temperature of the thorax during flight is maintained between 30o and 40o C regardless of ambient temperature. So how is this done? Well the hairs do provide some insulation, but to raise their temperature for flight they simply uncouple their wing muscles so that the wings themselves do not move, and use the muscles to shiver and raise their thorax temperature. Then when their thorax is warm enough they can fly.
This is why you may find some grounded bumblebees during cold spells in the spring. These are often queens, and you can help them by feeding them or moving them somewhere warm. When the queen is brooding in cold weather, probably early on in the nest life, she needs to warm up the bald patch on the underside of her abdomen (brood patch) to keep her eggs warm, so she needs to transfer heat from her thorax to her abdomen. Later the workers will also help to regulate the nest temperature keeping it at around 30oC. Now all bees, ants and wasps have a very narrow waist (petiole), this isn’t very easy to see in bumblebees as their hair makes them look so round and fat, but believe me they have a waist about as thin as a wasp’s as you can see in the drawing on the right.
The heat is transported to the abdomen by the heart pumping warm blood from the thorax through this narrow petiole (waist). This is also the method used to get rid of excess heat from the thorax on hot days to stop the bumblebee overheating. The heat is dissipated to the outside by inflating and deflating the large air sacs (see drawing above) in the abdomen. The air escapes through tiny holes, called spiracles, that are found down the side of most insects, usually one pair to each segment.
So temperature regulation in a bumblebee body works in a similar way to our bodies when we are cold, i.e. we both shiver to get warm. So it is really not correct to call a bumblebee a cold-blooded animal.
crazyotto65
January 15, 2014 at 10:00 pm
They have tiny little fans in their hives and sometimes the big momma bee turns the air con on.
sling it bird
January 15, 2014 at 10:05 pm
By flapping their wings… it comes naturaly to them
Rocks
January 15, 2014 at 10:23 pm
they keep cool by flapping there wings a lot!!!!
Gatorade
January 15, 2014 at 10:27 pm