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Articles on Social insects

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The queen, on the right with a larger, darker body, is bigger than the worker bees in the colony and lives several times longer. Jens Kalaene/picture alliance via Getty Images

Why do bees have queens? 2 biologists explain this insect’s social structure – and why some bees don’t have a queen at all

A queen’s main job in the hive is to lay eggs and pass genes on to offspring. But many bee species do just fine without queens or big colonies.
Ant colonies direct traffic flows of millions of individuals along the best routes – army ants even manage inbound and outbound lanes – but how? Geoff Gallice/Wikimedia

Nature’s traffic engineers have come up with many simple but effective solutions

Insects aren’t known for having big brains, and slime moulds and fungi don’t have any. So how do they solve challenges that test the ingenuity of human transport engineers?
A bee visits an almond flower – an essential process for almond farmers. Tiago J. G. Fernandez/Wikimedia Commons

The farmer wants a hive: inside the world of renting bees

Many fruits, nuts and other crops rely on bees to pollinate their flowers at just the right time of year. Many farmers rent bees to get the job done at pollination time.
They might be eating your home, but termites play a vital role in ecosystems. Termite image from www.shutterstock.com

Hidden housemates: the termites that eat our homes

Termite damage costs Australian homes at least a billion dollars each year – but they are absolutely vital for ecosystems.

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