While many bee species utilize the earth for their homes, honey bees typically do not nest in the ground. They have distinct nesting preferences, favoring enclosed and protected spaces.
Honey Bee Nesting Habits
Honey bees (Apis mellifera) are cavity-nesting insects. They naturally prefer to build homes in sheltered, darkened enclosures like hollow trees, rock crevices, or caves. These spaces provide protection from predators, adverse weather, and temperature fluctuations. Honey bees construct nests entirely from beeswax, secreted from glands on their abdomens.
Beeswax is molded into hexagonal cells that form parallel combs. These combs serve multiple purposes within the colony, including rearing young bees, storing honey, and holding pollen. While primarily found in natural cavities, honey bees also establish nests in man-made structures that mimic their preferred conditions, such as wall voids, attics, chimneys, or even compost bins.
Other Bees That Nest in the Ground
Over 70% of bee species worldwide build nests by digging in the soil. These ground-nesting bees exhibit diverse behaviors and appearances. Many are solitary, meaning each female constructs and provisions her own nest, though they may nest in aggregations in suitable areas.
Bumblebees often utilize abandoned rodent burrows or dense grass clumps for their nests, creating small, irregular wax pots. Mining bees (Andrena spp.) excavate tunnels in sunny, bare, or sparsely vegetated ground. Their nests often feature a vertical tunnel with side chambers and a small mound of excavated soil around the entrance.
Sweat bees (family Halictidae) are a common group, with most species nesting in the ground, though some may use rotten wood. They range in social behavior from solitary to primitively social, where some might share an entrance but maintain individual tunnels. Cellophane bees (Colletes spp.) are solitary ground nesters that line their tunnels and brood cells with a clear, waterproof secretion, allowing them to nest even in wet soils.
Telling the Difference
Distinguishing honey bees from ground-nesting bees involves observing their appearance, nest characteristics, and behavior. Honey bees are typically 10-15 millimeters long, with fuzzy, golden-yellow to brownish-black bodies and distinct dark bands on their abdomen. Ground-nesting bees vary significantly in appearance; for example, some sweat bees can be metallic green or blue, while mining bees might be dark-bodied with sparse hairs or have striking black and ash-grey patterns. Cellophane bees often resemble honey bees but may have more prominent antennae and thin, contrasting pale bands on their dark abdomens.
Nest appearance provides another indicator. Honey bee nests are hidden, internal structures of hexagonal beeswax combs, usually found within enclosed cavities in trees or buildings. Ground-nesting bees create small holes in the soil, often surrounded by a mound of dirt. These holes are typically about the width of a pencil or slightly larger.
Behavior at the nest also differs. Honey bees are highly social insects that live in large, organized colonies with a queen, workers, and drones. Their nests exhibit constant, high-traffic activity at a single, well-defined entrance as thousands of workers continuously enter and exit. Many ground-nesting bees are solitary or semi-social; individual females dig their own burrows, resulting in less organized, lower-traffic activity at separate holes, even if many nests are aggregated in one area.