[0:00] A honeybee hive might seem like a peaceful utopia,  
[0:03] but in reality, it’s buzzing with internal 
conflict between warring factions.
[0:08] And the biggest conflict is between 
the queen and the worker bees.
[0:12] Hi, I’m Cameron, and this is MinuteEarth.
[0:15] There are three types of 
bees in a hive: the queen,  
[0:17] who lays all the eggs, her daughters – the 
worker bees – and her sons – the drones.
[0:22] From the queen’s perspective, both 
workers and drones are valuable.  
[0:25] She needs daughters to run the hive, find 
food, nurse the larvae, and even feed her.
[0:30] But she also needs sons to pass along 
her genes by mating with other queens.
[0:35] So it makes sense for a queen bee to  
[0:37] lay as many eggs of both types – 
workers and drones – as she can.
[0:41] But the worker bees are the ones 
actually caring for those eggs,  
[0:44] and their priorities are way different; they’d 
benefit from more sisters to share the workload.
[0:49] What’s more, because of the weird way 
honeybee genetics works, which, by the way,  
[0:52] we made a whole other video about already, workers 
share about 75% of their genes with each other,  
[0:58] only 50% with the queen, and a mere 25% with 
the drones; in other words, it's genetically  
[1:04] beneficial for workers to favor their sisters 
over their much more distantly-related brothers.
[1:09] So they preferentially feed female 
larvae, leaving male larvae to  
[1:13] beg for scraps – which aren’t always 
enough to keep them alive. Sometimes,  
[1:17] workers will even kill drone larvae to 
free up food and care for more workers.
[1:21] So even though the queen is in charge of 
producing offspring, the workers ultimately  
[1:26] control the sex ratio of the hive, and they 
make sure that it’s producing mostly females;  
[1:31] as a result, honeybee workers can outnumber 
drones by a un-bee-lieveable ten to one.
[1:36] In other communal insects – 
like termites – where workers,  
[1:39] soldiers and royalty can be male or female, 
workers don’t give any preferential treatment;  
[1:44] these species’ sex ratios 
end up much more balanced.
[1:47] But honeybees’ worker-queen conflict goes 
much deeper than just spoiling sisters.
[1:52] Workers are also constantly keeping tabs on the 
queen’s health, and as soon as her egg-laying  
[1:57] slows down, they start feeding one of 
their baby sisters a special formula that  
[2:01] triggers her ovaries to start developing 
– this makes her a potential new queen.
[2:05] In order to keep her crown, the 
old queen has to constantly find  
[2:09] and kill these queens-to-be before they grow up.
[2:11] And if one does, two things can happen.
[2:14] The workers might gang up on the old queen 
and assassinate her –Julius Caesar style–
[2:18] or, the hive might fragment, with 
a ton of workers swearing fealty to  
[2:22] their new sister-queen and flying 
off to start a new hive with her.
[2:25] In either case, some, if not all, workers 
are supplanting their own mother with a  
[2:30] sister they’re more closely-related to, so 
that she can pass on their shared genes.
[2:35] But while things will be great 
for the new queen for a while,  
[2:39] her daughters might eventually 
decide to get rid of her too.
[2:41] So while it might seem awesome to be the 
Queen Bee, the reality can really sting.
[2:50] Bees are awesome, but like many other important 
pollinators, they are rapidly disappearing.
[2:55] The good news is we can actually help: 
that’s why we joined Planet Wild.
[2:59] Every month, we, as a community, fund a 
mission to restore our planet. We love that  
[3:04] they tackle problems with very specific goals 
and show the results on their Youtube channel.
[3:08] Like, how they helped save the habitat 
of Monarch butterflies in Mexico. If  
[3:12] you want to make a difference in nature, 
consider joining us over at Planet Wild.
[3:16] You can give whatever amount you 
like and the first 100 people to  
[3:19] sign up using our code MinuteEarth1 will 
get their first month paid for by us.
[3:23] Just scan this QR code or click 
the link in the description. And  
[3:26] there's no catch here – you can cancel anytime.
[3:29] If you want to see Planet Wild in action, 
check out their butterfly mission here.