HONEYBEE

Apis mellifera

The set of eight  honeybees are glove puppets but can also be used as freestanding models as they are detachable from their one-size-fits-all “magic” gloves using Velcro.

HONEYBEE JOB CENTRE ACTIVITY

During her short life of 4-6 weeks a worker (female) honeybee undertakes a series of jobs.

This role play activity aims to match up the capabilities of 6 unemployed worker honeybees with a range of job vacancies in the hive – nurses, cleaners, builders, packers, security guards and foragers are all needed. There is one drone (male) bee also looking for employment, but since his sole function in life is to chase the queen bee on her mating flight and mate with her, his long term job prospects (or indeed life prospects) are very poor.              The queen too is currently unemployed.

Read-aloud role play cards are provided as follows:

• 1 Honeybee Job Centre Manager to set the scene
• 8 numbered cards which introduce each individual bee -7 numbered bee puppets and the queen
• 9 job vacancy description cards

The object of the activity is to match up the bees with the jobs. Factsheets provided enable children to compose their own job adverts.

QUEEN HONEYBEE

The queen has a very long abdomen to store all her eggs in.

Since she has just the one skill to offer - egglaying- there is a very limited jobs market for queens.

The queen bee is fed all her life on Royal Jelly which worker bees make using a gland in their heads.

BUMBLEBEES

There are two bumblebee queen models, mounted on gloves -

Red tailed bumblebee (Bombus lapidarius) and 

Buff tailed bumblebee (Bombus terrestris)

The role play conversation between the two bumblebee queens takes place early in spring when they have recently emerged from hibernation and are looking for nest sites.

Bumblebees live in much smaller colonies than honeybees – maybe 50 in a nest, which is often underground. Only the queen bumblebee survives the winter.

RED MASON BEE (female)

(Osmia Rufa)

Red Mason bees are non-aggressive and very important as pollinators, in particular of fruit trees. They build a nest single-handedly and provide for their offspring but never see them.

The conversation provided between a Red Mason bee and a Honeybee highlights some of the differences between them.

A giant foraging honeybee and a giant apple blossom flower hold a conversation which explains what happens in Pollination. This can be linked to discussions on insect-friendly flower plantings to encourage a wide varity of pollinators.

More pollinator puppets are available including a Marmalade Hoverfly, a Common Wasp and a selection of butterflies - Small Tortoiseshell; Peacock; Red Admiral and Comma  - all of which are dependent on nettles as the food plant for their caterpillars, Holly Blue and  Wood White.  There is also an Elephant hawkmoth, which pollinates Honeysuckle. For more photos see the Gallery section.

SMALL TORTOISESHELL (Aglais urticae)

RED ADMIRAL (Vanessa atalanta)

COMMA (Polygonia c- album)

and PEACOCK (Aglais io) butterflies

all lay their eggs on stinging nettles. 

So don't pull up all your nettles!

The Flutter now comprises 29 species of British butterfly and one spectacular moth.

They are available for display together with their display arch and associated quiz.

See The Gallery for more photos.

Striking summer visitor. Hoards of them arrived in 2019 - a Painted Lady Year.

Male and female common blues. She is mainly brown rather than blue but they both have fabulous underwings.

These two have great similarities. Gatekeeper is slightly smaller and has TWO white dots on the eyespot as opposed to the Meadow Brown's ONE. How is your eyesight?