Nordic brown bee
Apis m. melliferaA queen bee can be identified by her size and the tapered body. Like the worker bees, her antennae are bent and she has a sting. Drones are bulkier, with straight antennae.
Lenght: 2 - 3,5 cm
Nordic brown bees are social insects and live in colonies comprising a queen, 200 to 1,000 drones and between 30,000 and 60,000 workers. A Nordic brown bee colony produces on average 30 kg of honey a year.
The queen lives for three to five years and mates with drones from other colonies. Queens lay 150,000 eggs between February and August.
There are some 20,000 known species of bee. Only four are being kept as honey bees.
Read about our efforts in the wild here.