All work and no vigilance makes a forager a dead bee

Honey bees are renowned for their hard work.  Outside the hive, foragers buzz rapidly from flower to flower, collecting nectar in a special stomach and pollen on their hind legs.  Inside the hive, there is constant motion as returning foragers communicate the locations of bountiful flower patches through 'waggle dances' and thousands of workers construct wax cells, process nectar into honey, store honey and pollen in the comb, and care for larvae.

Workers start out their adult lives with tasks inside the hive.  After a couple of weeks, workers may begin to leave the safety of the hive to forage.  While their single-minded dedication to work is often commended, their frequent neglect of danger as they carry out their tasks demonstrates the downside of being 'busy as a bee'.

The loss of a single forager is not very costly for a large honey bee colony and most foragers eventually expire out in the field.  However, as I'll show in a follow-up post, some other bee species are much more careful about what flowers they approach.