Last Updated on June 3, 2026 by Staff
For a time people who study honeybees thought that the key to making a queen was pretty simple: just feed a young honeybee larva a lot of royal jelly and it would become a queen. Royal jelly is a food that worker honeybees make and it was thought to be the main reason that a honeybee larva would grow up to be a queen.
Some new research that was published in the magazine Nature says that this is not the whole story. Becoming a honeybee queen is not about what you eat. The whole honeybee colony works together to make sure that a larva has the conditions to grow into a healthy and strong queen honeybee.
The people who did this research found out that the honeybee colony has a complicated system that includes special rooms for the queen to grow in worker honeybees that take care of her and a special environment that is just right for her to develop.
Royal Cribs
The researchers looked at the rooms where the queen honeybees grow which are sometimes called “royal cribs”. These rooms are different from the rooms where the worker honeybees grow. They are bigger and shaped like peanuts. They are made just for the queen.
The researchers found out that these special rooms are made out of a kind of wax that is different from the wax that the worker honeybees use. This wax is not as hard, it is more flexible. It helps to keep the room warm and cozy for the growing honeybee larva.
They also found out that the wax has chemicals in it that help the queen honeybee to grow. To see if the room itself was important the researchers grew some honeybee larvae in the wax and some in the regular wax. Even when they ate the food the larvae that grew in the regular wax were more likely to die and the ones that did survive were not as strong.
This shows that the room where the queen grows is very important for her health and success.
Special Workers
The researchers also found out that there are some special worker honeybees that take care of the queen. These honeybees are called “queen cell builders”. They are different from the other worker honeybees.
They are usually younger. They have some special characteristics that help them to take care of the queen. They are warmer than the honeybees, which helps to keep the queen’s room warm. They also shape the special wax that is used to make the queen’s room.
The researchers did an experiment where they put a bit of graphite in the honeycomb and they found out that the queen cell builders would collect it and use it to make the queen’s room. This shows that they are very careful and selective about what they use to make the queen’s room.
Faster Growth
One of the things about the queen’s special room is that it helps her to grow faster. Queen honeybees grow in 16 days while worker honeybees take about 21 days.
This is important because if the colony loses its queen it needs to be able to make one quickly. The warm temperature in the queen’s room helps her to grow faster and be stronger.
The researchers say that the way the honeybee colony takes care of the queen is like a court. Everything is done to help the queen grow and be successful.
Meaning
The researchers found out that this is true for honeybees all over the world, not just in one place. This means that honeybees have been doing this for millions of years and it is very important for their survival.
This research can also help us to understand how other living things grow and develop. It shows that the environment and the social group that an animal lives in can be very important for its development.
A honeybee queen is not just made by what she eats. By the whole colony working together to give her the right conditions to grow. The special workers. Take care of her room, regulate the temperature and make sure she has everything she needs to be healthy and strong.
This research shows how organized and complicated honeybee colonies are. They are not a group of individual honeybees but a whole system that works together to make sure the colony survives.