蜜蜂是怎樣過冬的？
[ 2007-01-19 11:10 ]
蜜蜂是人類的寶貴助手。它們可謂是大自然的精靈。但是精靈的身材非常嬌小單薄，不知道它們怎樣才能度過嚴(yán)寒的冬季。下面這篇文章就來為您介紹一二。
 The survival of the bee through the cold months of
winter is largely dependent upon the particular kind of over 1,000 species to
which it belongs. Generally speaking, the social bees do not summer in the South
during the winter, as do migratory birds, but, instead, live or die in their
natural environs.
The young queen bumblebee, who
earns her title by being the one egg-laying female, or queen mother, in the
colony of social bees, does survive the winter. She does so by burrowing out a
hold in a well-drained sandbank, or simply by taking the easy way out by moving
into a pre-owned home, such as a deserted mouse nest. Once settled into her
nest, she plays happy homemaker and makes beebread from the nectar and the
pollen she collected all summer, dumps the load of bread, lays eggs on it,
covers it with wax, and relaxes atop it.
Approximately 250,000 eggs later, her Highness washes her hands of the whole
thing, and leaves the work to her offspring. As soon as the workers, or
fertilized, but non-egg producing females sprout wings, they set to work, and
only later get assistance in the form of drones, or unfertilized males. The
workers bees and drones, who toiled for the queen all summer, are rewarded for
their efforts by a certain death in winter. No bother...they are easily replaced
by cheap labor, when the queen lays more eggs in the spring, and puts her new
brood to work.
Her counterpart, the young queen honeybee, earns her title by being the first
of the special queen cells to emerge, and literally kills her competition, her
sisters, in their queen cells, before they have the chance to emerge. The colony she rules is the epitome of
efficiency, as it adapts to endure a full range of adverse climates. This
species of honey-producing bee, ergo the honeybee, winters in a
temperature-controlled hive. The worker bee thermostatically controls his hive
with great precision, ensuring that the temperature in the hive's nursery, where
baby bees are developing, is maintained at 93 degrees Fahrenheit, and that the
temperature in the remainder of the hive does not drop below 45 degrees
Fahrenheit. The worker bees accomplish this winter task by fueling up on the
honey that they have stored, and by releasing heat as they feast.
The honeybee wisely keeps a stash of honey for himself, after the beekeeper
has had his take, thus benefiting from his labor in the warmer months. The
social bees utilize these months in a productive manner, by buzzing from flower
to flower, sucking up the flowers' nectar as they bumble along. The nectar the
bees extract from the flower flows to their honey sacs, which are enlargements
of their digestive tracts, and are located in front of the belly of the bees.
Here, the sugars from the sweet nectar of the flower, chemically transform,
and are reduced through the honeybee's built-in mechanism to evaporate large
quantities of water contained in the nectar. The honeybee stores the end
product, honey, both internally, and externally. Pooh-like "honeypot" cells
store the thinner version of honey, honey with a short "shelf-life," and
honeycombs, the more concentrated version, honey with the "shelf-life" of canned
goods in wartime. In a sense, the honeybee is preparing to combat, and to
survive, the bitter winter months that lie ahead.
bumblebee: 大黃蜂
emerge: 出生
（英語點津 Annabel 編輯） |
