Bees and Honey Vocabulary

Caste: specialized form of a polymorphic social insect that carries out a particular

function in the colony

Drones: male honeybee; large, stout body and large eyes; main job is to mate with

Queen

Extract: to remove by physical or chemical process

            Honey: a sweet, sticky material made out of the nectar of flowers in the stomach

of various bees

            Honeybee: a social honey-producing bee in phylum Arthropoda, class Insecta,

order hymenoptora

            Honeycomb: a structure of hexagonal wax cells built by honeybees in their nest to

contain brood and stores of honey, pollen, and bee bread

Insect: an animal of phylum Arthropoda, class Insecta with well-defined head,

thorax, and abdomen, only three pairs of legs, and typically one or two pairs of wings

Larva: the immature, wingless, and often vermiform (worm-like) feeding form

that hatches from the egg of many insects, alters chiefly in size while

passing through several molts, and is finally transformed into a pupa or

chrysalis from which the adult emerges

Nectar: a sweet liquid that is secreted by the nectaries of a plant and is the chief

raw material of honey

Pupa: an intermediate usually quiescent stage of a metamorphic insect that occurs

between the larva and the imago (adult) is usually enclosed in a cocoon or

case, and undergoes internal changes by which larval structures are

replaced by those typical of the adult

Queen: egglayer in the colony, larger than worker and longer than drone, may lay

up to 3,000 eggs/day

Workers: female bees that are the smallest members of the colony and most

plentiful, main workers in the hive