Females Work on this "Honey-Do List"

Did you know that the females do ALL of the work in the honey bee world? Between 1-3 days of age, they clean the hive and regulate the temperature. Some of the honey bees flap their wings at the entrance to the hive to create air conditioning!

The list of tasks increases with each day. By the time they are 21 days of age, the female honey bees have learned to fly and forage for food by collecting pollen and nectar from flowers.

There are even more fascinating facts, flower gardens and fun for everyone at the new Honey Bee Garden exhibit at the North Carolina Zoo, Asheboro. The zoo is located in the NC Piedmont, a central and convenient location to access from all areas of the state.


The exhibit is a pleasant place to linger at the NC Zoo™. There are winding garden paths with comfortable benches as well as a huge, bronze honey bee sculpture for children to climb while parents enjoy the photo opportunities.

Inside the "Honey Bee Barn" a live hive can be viewed through glass. Bees enter and exit the hive through a glass tube from the outside. The hive buzzes with activity and the honeycombs are visible, too.

Of course, the gardens encourage visitors to plant flowers for the bees while the videos, posters, and signs explain the importance of pollinators, such as bees and butterflies, to the world's food supply. The educational displays are easy for children to understand while being interesting enough for adults to learn a lot about honey bees, too.

The importance of wildflowers, trees and even weeds in bloom is expressed along the pathway signs through the gardens.

Gardeners, you will appreciate this advice for your honey-do list - let weeds bloom first, then pull before they set seed - so that the honey bees have time to collect pollen from the weed blooms!


Photos and story by Freda Cameron; Location: NC Zoo™, Asheboro, NC; August 2009