What Are a Bee's Weaknesses?

Smoke

• Smoke slightly repels bees and confuses them. When beekeepers direct smoke at hives, the guard bees within do not react in defense of the nest, as normal. This allows beekeepers to manipulate hives, move queens, examine hives and extract honey. Because the bees move away from the smoke, beekeepers can blow smoke into the top of hives and force bees deeper into them. This helps reduce bee casualties when pulling apart and inspecting hives.

Cold

• Cold weather makes bees slower than usual. Extreme cold can even put them into a sleep-like state. If it is not too cold or cold for too long, the bees awaken from this state when they become warm. Temperatures below 90 degrees Fahrenheit in beehives can lead to stunted growth in the colony's pupae and cause adult bees to have behavioral and neurological impairments. Bees regulate the temperature within their colonies endothermically, meaning individuals warm themselves, thus warming their hives. If the hive gets too warm, they fan their wings and bring water to the hives for cooling the combs.

Barbed Stingers

• The defenses of honeybees -- their stingers -- are also weaknesses. When honeybees sting their victims, their stingers becomes stuck because of barbs along them. When honeybees try to extract their stingers, or the sting victims pull the bee off, the stinger rips off the bee, often taking innards with it. Because of this, honeybees typically die when they use their stingers. No other species of bee has this problem.

Colony Collapse Disorder

• Colony collapse disorder is the disappearance of adult bees from hives. This is different from swarms leaving to make a new colony, or colonies dying from lack of a queen. The major difference is that the disappearing bees often leave behind their queen, food and developing young. This is uncharacteristic of bees, which typically wait until the capped brood emerges before moving on. Another interesting factor in colony collapse disorder is that other insects, which normally scavenge abandoned hives, immediately do not approach the abandoned hives. The cause of colony collapse disorder is currently unknown, but colonies are helpless against it.