{"id":254168,"date":"2026-06-03T19:55:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T19:55:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/254168\/"},"modified":"2026-06-03T19:55:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T19:55:16","slug":"queen-bees-have-royal-court-like-buckingham-palace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/254168\/","title":{"rendered":"Queen bees have \u2018royal court like Buckingham Palace\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Royal cribs and ladies-in-waiting may seem the exclusive preserve of the monarchy. But scientists have found that queen honeybees<\/a> also have special attendants who construct heated nurseries to keep them warm, safe and nourished as they grow.<\/p>\n

It was previously thought queens only differed from regular honeybees<\/a> because they were fed royal jelly \u2013 an ultra-rich secretion packed with proteins, amino acids, fats and vitamins.<\/p>\n

Now scientists have uncovered a new kind of honeybee, called a \u201cqueen cell builder\u201d, whose job it is to pamper the growing queen and build royal chambers with custom wax.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can think of it as something like Buckingham Palace,\u201d said Prof Boris Baer, entomologist and director of the Centre for Integrative Bee Research at the University of California<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a dedicated group of bees focused entirely on raising the queen, and if they don\u2019t get it right, the colony cannot reproduce.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prof Baer said the process of raising a queen was \u201cmuch more sophisticated\u201d than anyone had imagined.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cThe old idea was relatively simple: take an egg, move it into a queen cell, feed it royal jelly and you get a queen<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we found is that there\u2019s an entire machinery behind this process.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The \u2018queen cell builder\u2019 is responsible for constructing a warm and moist \u2018royal crib\u2019 – Markus Imhoof\/More than Honey<\/p>\n

When a hive needs a new queen, worker bees select an ordinary, newly hatched female larva that is around one to three days old and modify normal hexagonal cells into spacious, peanut-shaped structures which hang down from the comb.<\/p>\n

Normal bees are fed on \u201cbee bread\u201d, a fermented mix of pollen and nectar, but queens get royal jelly, which contains proteins that activate the ovaries and extend lifespan.<\/p>\n

Once mature, the queen becomes the colony\u2019s sole egg-layer, responsible for producing the next generation of bees.<\/p>\n

To find out more about how queens are raised, scientists at the University of California used thermal imaging, behavioural tracking, materials and chemical testing, and found that queen cells differ sharply from the hexagonal chambers used to rear worker bees.<\/p>\n

The large queen cells are built using specialised wax that has distinct physical and chemical properties and produces chemical signals.<\/p>\n

Scientists said it showed the cell is not a \u201cpassive container\u201d but an \u201cengineered bioactive micro-environment\u201d that helps the queen to develop.<\/p>\n

To test whether the nursery itself mattered, the researchers raised developing queens in cells made either from queen wax or ordinary worker wax.<\/p>\n

Larvae raised in worker wax were more likely to die and grew into smaller queens, even when fed the same diet, suggesting that the surrounding environment plays a critical role in development.<\/p>\n

The study also revealed the workers behind the specialised cells, queen cell builders, were typically younger than other hive workers and had a higher body temperature when tending future queens to keep their charges warm.<\/p>\n

The extra warmth appears to speed development: queen bees mature in about 16 days, compared with roughly 21 days for worker bees, an advantage when a colony urgently needs a new ruler.<\/p>\n

Scientists said that the process resembles something closer to a royal court than a simple insect nursery. It is clear that bees execute a tightly coordinated effort devoted to producing the colony\u2019s next ruler.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis work highlights how much sophistication exists inside insect societies,\u201d added Prof Baer.<\/p>\n

\u201cHoneybee colonies are not simply collections of individuals. They function as integrated biological systems capable of engineering their own environments.\u201d<\/p>\n

The researchers found the same pattern in both Asian and European honeybee species, suggesting the strategy may be deeply rooted in honeybee evolution.<\/p>\n

The findings were published in the journal Nature.<\/p>\n

Try full access to The Telegraph free today. Unlock their award-winning website and essential news app, plus useful tools and expert guides for your money, health and holidays.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Royal cribs and ladies-in-waiting may seem the exclusive preserve of the monarchy. But scientists have found that queen…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":254169,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[99052,9,24,63,99057,99056,99053,99055,122,124,123,99054,99051,13824],"class_list":["post-254168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-group-of-bees","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-prof-baer","tag-prof-boris-baer","tag-queen-cell","tag-queen-cells","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-royal-chambers","tag-royal-jelly","tag-worker-bees"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}