Mangesh Hattikudur
Good Hivekeeping
by Mangesh Hattikudur - January 19, 2007 - 1:47 PM

Picture 2.pngMan, I remember hearing all about the birds from my father-son chat with Pops, but apparently he didn’t do much of a job clueing me in on the bees. Thankfully, New Scientist is happy to fill in the gaps: They’ve got a fascinating article up today on what bumblebees do to adjust the temp in their hives.

“Bumblebees warm and cool their hives to keep the brood of the next generation at just the right temperature – between 28°C and 32°C. When temperatures get too hot, they cool them by fanning their wings. And when it gets chilly, the bees vibrate their wing muscles to shunt heat down to their abdomen, which they hold up against larvae-containing comb.

Crazy! Anyway, you can read the entire article here.

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Comments (1)
  1. Do you also know that we’ve lost 92% of honeybees on Earth both wild and domestic? Now, that’s not only interesting, but sad and pretty darn scary.

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