Kamikazi Honey Bees

Honey bees spend the vast majority of the winter season hibernating but that doesn't mean that there is nothing going on inside the hive.  During the winter months, the bees continue to eat honey, raise some brood and move around a bit in a cluster formation.

Bee hive in the winter, covered in snow.

On warmer, sunny days (when temperatures reach about 0 degrees C) some of the bees take cleansing flights outside the hive to get some fresh air into their lungs and some exercise.  However, bees can't fly very far until temperatures reach about 10 degrees C, so throughout the winter we find dead bees littered in the snow surrounding the hive.  These bees went for cleansing flights, got chilled and weren't able to make it back inside the hive alive.

Dead bees in the snow around the entrance of the hive.

Hive entrance after I removed the bee carcasses.

 Usually the bees that die outside on these flights are the oldest bees in the colony and would have died shortly anyway even if they had remained in the hive.  Often these bees are also sick with tracheal mites and have chosen to make the ultimate sacrifice for the good of the colony by flying to somewhere outside the hive where the mites inside them can't infect any other bees upon their death.

To a new beekeeper the numerous bees found dead in the snow is initially somewhat shocking.  I remember thinking, "Are there any bees left alive inside the hive?"  But when you remember that a hive is composed of between 20,000 - 30,000 bees in the winter, a few hundred "Kamikazi" bees is put into perspective.

This Kamikazi bee made the ultimate sacrifice.