Bees are awesome, but they're also little savages. They can change their brain chemistry and do all sorts of wonky little bee tricks. Steer clear of these buggers.
This honey bee works harder than you ever will.
Don’t you ever call a honey bee lazy. These little f*ckers work hard and never complain when they have to work past five o’clock. So next time you’re feeling overworked, just think of the honeybee and how it literally works itself to death. That’s right, it would rather die than stop being a productive member of the hive.
Benjamin Button? More like Benjamin Beetton.
Bee brains were the inspiration behind the Benjamin Button movie. Jk, not really, but they are capable of some Benjamin Button type sh*t. When an elderly bee has to do a job usually reserved for younger bees, they basically defy the laws of time and space and make their brain stop aging. They can even make their brain age in reverse. How fun is that? Grandpa to baby brains in a matter of hours. Sick.
They see you for what your truly are.
Benjamin button brains are no joke, but if you thought that was cool, just wait till you hear this: honeybees can recognize human faces. That’s right, they know who you are. They see your eyebrows, ears, nose and lips and fit them together to make out your sorry excuse for a face (jk you’re beautiful). It’s called “configular processing,” and it might help computer scientists improve face recognition technology.
Bees have feelings too.
Next time you insult a bee, think twice, because these little f*ckers have feelings. Some bees are thrill-seekers, others are timid. A 2011 study even found that agitated honeybees can be pessimistic, showing that bees might have feelings just like we do. So instead of swatting at the little bugger with your sweaty, meaty hand, smile and say something nice. Break their hearts, and they’ll break your face (and remember, they know what your look like).
Bees help us catch serial killers.
Wanna know why people are so scared of bees? You may think it’s because they sting, but you’d be wrong. It’s because serial killers behave like them. They commit crimes close to home, but far away enough that the neighbors don’t get suspicious. Bees act the same way when collecting pollen near their hive. Smart little f*ckers. Scientists think so too because they’ve written up a few algorithms based on bee behavior and their findings improved computer models police use to find felons. So next time you see a bee, thank it for helping put the bad guys away behind bars.
Bees are crack addicts.
One day the psycho scientists at Newcastle University woke up and decided to lace the flowers with caffeine and cocaine, because why not? Turns out the caffeine helped the bees remember where the flower was and made them work better, but the cocaine turned the bees into big fat liars. Bees “dance” to communicate where all the good food is, and after sipping some cocaine nectar their little bee dance became exaggerated as they overemphasized the food’s quality. Little f*ckers wanted all the cocaine for themselves! They even exhibited withdrawal symptoms.
These are some smart little buggers.
In case you’ve been living under a rock, you should know that bees are the geniuses of the bug world. While they buzz and make honey combs and do all sorts of other bee things, they’re also able to determine what’s the shortest route possible between flowers. Dubbed the “traveling salesman problem” by mathematicians, bees are able to solve a problem that stumps computers and are the only animals known to have solved the problem. Give these guys a noble prize already.
Bee brains are awesome.
If you cry and run like a little baby every time you hear a buzz over your shoulder, cut that sh_t out now. The honeybee don’t care about you. It has more important things to do like its friggin’ job. Each bee is hardwired to do a certain task. Scout bees search for food and love the thrill of adventure. Soldier bees are the beefiest of the bunch and secure the hive from intruders. Middle-aged bees become undertakers, removing dead bees from the hive, but the regular honeybees are the baddest of them all. Not only do they perform multiple jobs in their lifetime, but they’re so dedicated to their job that they change their f_cking brain chemistry before taking up a new gig. Can you say employee of the month?
The great architects of the world.
The Egyptians and their silly pyramids ain’t got nothing on bees. Bees are the great architects of the world. In 36 BC, Marcus Terentius Varro argued that honeycombs were the most practical structures around and many years later Thomas Hales wrote a 19-page mathematical proof showing that not only are honeycombs the most efficient structures in nature, but these bees are so good that they build their honeycomb walls at a precise 120-degree angle, a perfect hexagon. Boom. Mad skillz.
All hail the queen bee.
Honeybees live for their queen. They guard her every move. Without their queen, they have no purpose in life. Without their queen, the whole colony dies. But it’s not easy being a queen. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t always wake up looking flawless. And when a young virgin queen (yes, that’s the correct scientific name) emerges from a queen cell within the hive, she will seek out the other virgin queen rivals and attempt to kill them. It’s basically the hunger games and only one virgin queen can survive.
You really don’t want to upset the queen bee.
Virgin queens will quickly find and kill (by stinging) any other emerged virgin queens, or be killed themselves. Those bee-otches. They’ll even kill the virgin queens who haven’t even hatched yet. That’s right, they’re baby killers! This sh_t is so dark not even Stephen King could think of something this sh_tty. Cross a queen, get creamed (and when I say creamed I mean stung to death).
Beehive mutiny
Sometimes the worker bees will intervene to prevent the virgin queens from fighting, but as soon as they’re left alone again, they fight to the death until only one remains. You don’t even want to know what happens to the old queens. Okay, okay, I’ll tell you. If a hive has a virgin queen and an old queen, the old queen will either be allowed to live or forced out to fend for herself. The elderly get no respect. If the old queen is allowed to stay in the hive, she’s forced to continue laying eggs until she dies a natural death a couple weeks later and the virgin queen takes her place.
That’s one busy queen bee…
The queen bee is the only fertile bee in the hive, which means she gets all the action. A hive can contain thousands of worker bees and they’re all the queen bee’s children. The queen bee would never do something so drab as mate inside the hive. No, she mates with her drone bees in mid-flight. That’s right, they do the nasty over our heads. The drone bees are the only males in the hive and they’re alive for one purpose only—to get their queen prego. After they have sex with the queen, they die. So next time you’re having a bad day, just be thankful you’re not a drone bee.
Long live the virgin queen!
Sometimes a virgin bee will try to sneak out of their hive before another virgin queen can kill them. If the sneaky virgin bee manages to successfully get away, she has two options: live a life of solitude or get all power hungry and try to take over another hive. The latter is a very risky move because they could either be welcomed by the new hive and live a long happy queen bee life, giving birth to thousands of little worker bees, OR they could be immediately killed if that hive already has a queen bee. Effing monsters.
Backstabbing bees
Sometimes queen bees die prematurely via a “cuddle death.” Adorable, right? WRONG. When a new queen is born and the worker bees are sick of their old queen, they will kill their reigning queen by “balling” her, which involves all the worker bees clustering tightly around their queen and vibrating until she overheats and dies. BEES ARE SAVAGE AF.
If you see a queen bee, RUN!
Everyone knows that bees die after stinging a human (unlike their evil cousin, the wasp, who lives forever and ever no matter how many times they sting you). Welp, it turns out that the queen bee’s stinger is not barbed, unlike the worker bees, which means she’s able to sting us repeatedly without dying. Evil Mofo. Ball her, ASAP!