The queen bee, a central figure in a honey bee colony, plays a unique role in reproduction. While worker bees are constantly seen flying, the queen’s flight habits are often misunderstood. Her activity outside the hive is limited, leading many to question if she flies. The answer is more nuanced than a simple yes or no.
The Queen’s Crucial Flights
A queen bee does indeed fly, but her flights are purposeful and limited to specific life stages. The first significant flights are her mating flights, which typically occur between 3 and 12 days after she emerges from her queen cell. During these aerial journeys, a virgin queen seeks out “drone congregation areas” where she mates with multiple male bees, known as drones. She may take several mating flights over a few days. Successful mating allows her to store enough sperm in a specialized organ, the spermatheca, to fertilize eggs for the remainder of her life, which can last for several years.
The other scenario requiring a queen to fly is during a swarm. Swarming is the natural process by which a bee colony reproduces itself, dividing into two or more new colonies. In preparation for a swarm, the older queen reduces her egg-laying and loses up to 25% of her body weight. She then leaves the original hive with a significant portion of the worker bees to establish a new home. The swarm often settles on a nearby object, such as a tree branch, only a few meters from the hive, before scout bees find a more permanent location.
A Life Primarily Grounded
While these flights are essential for the colony’s continuation, they represent a small fraction of the queen’s life. Once a queen has successfully mated and returned to the hive, her primary function shifts to egg-laying. She typically remains inside the hive for the rest of her life, rarely venturing outside again.
Her body becomes heavy and distended with eggs, making sustained flight impractical. Worker bees attend to her, providing food, grooming, and removing waste, allowing her to focus on prolific egg production, sometimes laying up to 2,000 eggs per day during peak seasons. This sedentary existence contrasts sharply with the constant foraging flights of worker bees, explaining why many people might assume a queen bee does not fly.