CATDOLL : CATDOLL: Please entomologist help me explain!

1. Please ask an entomologist to explain it to me!

Flies and bees are both insects, but they belong to different orders of the class Insecta. In fact, the difference is quite big. Bees have two pairs of wings, while flies only have one pair of wings that can be seen, and the other pair is degenerate. Flies and mosquitoes are more closely related, both of which belong to the order Diptera.

Bees and ants are close relatives among animals. They are both in the order Hymenoptera of the class Insecta. Bees belong to the superfamily Apoidea, while ants belong to the superfamily Vespoidea. Both evolved from primitive wasp ancestors. The time of differentiation is about 1 billion years.

The bee-like thing you mentioned is probably a syrphid fly, which belongs to the order Diptera.

------China Western Life Sciences Forum

Flies and bees both belong to the order Hymenoptera. The "bee-like fly" is neither a bee nor a fly. It is more closely related to flies than bees.

2. Do ants and wasps have the same ancestor?

This involves the principles of taxonomy. From large to small, they are divided into kingdom-phylum-class-order-family-genus-species, which are called taxonomic levels.

According to the theory of biological evolution, insects evolved from a common ancestor, so some species are closely related, while others are more distantly related. Closely related species will be similar in appearance and habits. When these related species are combined, they form a genus. A combination of multiple genera with similar characteristics is a family. Similarly, we can get orders, classes, etc. There are also more detailed superclasses, subclasses, superfamilies, subfamilies, etc.

The class Insecta is generally divided into 33-34 orders. Ants and wasps are both Hymenoptera, so they are closely related insects. According to the classification:

Ants are insects belonging to the animal kingdom, phylum Arthropoda, class Insecta, order Hymenoptera, superfamily Vespoidea, family Formicidae. There are many species of ants.

Wasps are insects belonging to the Animal Kingdom, Arthropoda, Insecta, Hymenoptera, Vespoidea, and Vespidae, and there are many subdivided species.

Therefore, ants are not the product of the degeneration of wasps, but are related insects with similar appearance and habits.

They are from the same ancestor! It's just that they have lived in different environments for too long! Just like when the dinosaurs became extinct, only similar mammals like mice survived (I remember the American documentary). How many species of mammals are there in the world now?

No. They are just similar and should be considered the same family, but ants cannot be a degenerate species of hornets. Because first of all, geographical isolation is impossible, and genetic mutation is impossible. All things are constantly evolving from the most primitive animals, so the ancestors are the same, but they cannot be a degenerate species of hornets.

3. The relationship between ants and bees

Bees and ants are both Hymenoptera insects in entomology, and both have strong group nature. These two types of insects do not have a mutual aid relationship with each other, but they have strong cooperation ability with their companions, so they are also vividly called "social insects."

Lei Bowen, please accept me.

bee

Honey bees belong to the order Hymenoptera, family Apidae. They are 8-20 mm long, yellowish brown or dark brown, and covered with dense hair. The head is almost as wide as the thorax. The antennae are knee-shaped, the compound eyes are oval and hairy, the mouthparts are chewing and sucking, and the hind legs are pollen-carrying legs. They have two pairs of membranous wings; the forewings are large, the hindwings are small, and the front and back wings are linked by a row of wing hooks. The abdomen is nearly oval, with less hair than the thorax, and there is a stinger at the end of the abdomen. Honey bees undergo complete metamorphosis, and they go through four stages in their life: egg, larva, pupa, and adult.

In the bee society, they still live a matriarchal life. Among the members of their group family, there is a queen bee (queen bee), which is a female bee with reproductive ability, responsible for laying eggs and reproducing offspring, and at the same time "ruling" this large family. Although the queen bee has mated, not all the eggs she lays are fertilized. According to the needs of the group family, it can lay fertilized eggs that will develop into female bees (worker bees without reproductive ability) in the future; it can also lay unfertilized eggs that will develop into drones in the future. When the members of this group family reproduce too much and cause crowding, it is necessary to divide the group. The process of dividing the group is as follows: the worker bees make a special honeycomb - the royal cell, and the queen bee lays fertilized eggs in the royal cell; after the small larvae hatch, the worker bees give them special treatment and feed them with the highly nutritious royal jelly produced in their bodies. When the small larvae develop into adults, they become new queen bees with reproductive ability. The new queen bee will lead a part of the worker bees to fly away to form a new group. Apis cerana Fabr. and A. mellifera L. are both commonly raised beneficial insects. During the breeding process, after the new queen bee is born, it must be divided into groups manually, otherwise a queen bee will lead a group of worker bees to leave the hive and fly away, resulting in the loss of the bee colony. Beekeepers use artificial methods to produce royal jelly, which is actually to artificially make some royal cells and put them in the beehive for the queen bee to lay eggs. When the larvae are hatched and the worker bees are fed with royal jelly, the beekeeper will take out the royal jelly. In fact, the beekeeper is using a trick, which shows that even smart little bees can be deceived.

There are a lot of drones, and there may be nearly a thousand of them in a colony. The only duty of a drone is to mate with the queen bee. During mating, the queen bee flies out of the hive, and the drones in the colony follow after her. This is called a nuptial flight. The queen bee's nuptial flight mate selection is carried out through a flying competition, and only the winner can become a mate. After mating, the drone's reproductive organs fall off into the queen bee's reproductive organs. At this time, the drone has completed its life mission and died. The drones that failed to mate with the queen bee only know how to eat and drink after returning to the nest, and they cannot collect honey. They become superfluous lazy bees in the bee colony. As time goes by, the workers will expel them. Beekeepers are also reluctant to keep too many drones in the bee colony to consume honey, so they eliminate them artificially. From this point of view,

Worker bees are the most numerous in this group. The number of worker bees that beekeepers keep in a bee colony varies according to the season, and is generally between 20,000 and 50,000 worker bees. Worker bees are the most hardworking. The children's song "Little bees, busy all day, collecting nectar and making honey" only refers to worker bees. In addition to collecting pollen and making honey, building nests, feeding larvae, cleaning the environment, and protecting the bee colony are also the tasks of worker bees. From spring to late autumn, when plants bloom, bees are busy every day. Winter is the only short period of leisure for bees. However, cold weather and low temperatures in the hive are not good for bees, because bees are cold-blooded animals, and their body temperature changes with the temperature of the surrounding environment. The wise little bees have come up with a special way to resist the severe cold. When the temperature in the hive drops to 13°C, they move closer to each other in the hive and form a ball. The lower the temperature, the tighter the ball, which reduces the surface area of ​​the bee ball and increases its density to prevent excessive cooling. According to measurements, in the coldest time, the temperature inside the bee ball can still be maintained at around 24°C. At the same time, they also use eating more honey and increasing exercise to generate heat to increase the temperature inside the hive. When the weather is cold, the temperature of the surface of the bee ball is lower than that of the center of the ball. At this time, the bees on the surface of the ball drill into the center of the ball, while the bees in the center of the ball move outward. They take care of each other and exchange positions repeatedly to survive the cold winter. How do they eat the honey stored in the hive during the wintering period? The clever little bees have their own tricks. They do not need to dissolve the ball and crawl out to eat separately, but get food by passing it to each other. This can keep the temperature inside the ball unchanged or less changed, which is conducive to safe wintering.

Learn about bees Other bees The superfamily Apoidea includes nearly 20% of the Hymenoptera. The so-called Hymenoptera are those insects that undergo frequent metamorphosis, have membranous wings, and mouthparts that can lick and grind. The superfamily Apoidea includes 20,000 species, all of which feed on nectar and pollen. Most of them are solitary, but some are in the beginning stages of colony life. However, no species live in a strict colony like the advanced bees of the family Apidae. The family Apidae is the only family of bees that live in society, and includes the genera Apis, Bombus, and Stingless Bees.

Apis

There are four species in this genus, all of which are social insects that live in groups. They are distributed all over the world and increase their numbers through swarming. Bees in this genus all use dance to point their companions to nectar sources.

The Indian giant bee, the flower bee and the Indian bee all live in Asia and all build their nests in the air. The Indian giant bee is very aggressive and its sting is very terrible. The Indian giant bee builds its nest on large branches. Their nest is a row of honeycombs, 0.75-1 meter long.

Flower bees, also known as "dwarf" bees, are only half the size of honey bees, but they are colorful. Their nests are also only one row, but they are small and exquisite, 8 cm wide and 12 cm long.

The Indian bee is the bee that most resembles the honey bee.

There are four species of bees distributed around the world, each with different habitats. Three of them live in Asia, where they build suspended nests. The Indian giant bee prefers to live in the mountains, and can live at an altitude of 2,000 meters. This bee is mainly distributed in Southeast Asia and the Philippines. The flower bee lives no more than 500 meters above sea level, and its distribution area is the same as that of the Indian giant bee. The Indian bee is distributed in a large area of ​​Asia, including China and parts of Siberia.

The fourth type is the honey bee. This type of bee is most widespread in the West. They live in several European countries (Spain, England, Germany and France), where they are also domesticated. They also live in Africa. With the colonization movement, honey bees also came to America, Australia and New Zealand. They build nests in natural caves or artificial hives, and are also well adapted to living in the mountains.

Pollination

The only way for higher plants to reproduce is through pollination, that is, the transfer of pollen from the stamens to the pistils. Wind-pollinated plants are pollinated by the wind, but 80% of higher plants are insect-pollinated plants, which means they rely on insects for pollination. Domestic bees undertake 65%-95% of insect-pollinated tasks, but the most active pollinators are solitary bees such as leafcutter bees. People believe that the economic benefits of bee pollination are far more than just honey production.

Natural enemies and parasites

Bees are a delicacy for many natural enemies, but no natural enemy can destroy the entire colony of bees by eating a few bees. The natural enemies of bees are insectivorous birds such as swallows, bee-eaters, and tits. If the winter is very cold, the green woodpecker will use its powerful beak to peck through the beehive and eat the bees that have been closed for the winter. Honey buzzards, which are birds of prey, are not afraid of stings because of their dense feathers. They destroy beehives and eat bee eggs and larvae. Some insects are also bee killers. They sting and kill bees. Mud wasps are one of them. They look like large wasps. After catching a bee, they squeeze its abdomen to extract all the nectar, and then leave the bee's remains as food for their larvae. Dragonflies are terrible carnivorous insects, and they also regard bees as delicacies. Spiders set webs to catch bees, crab spiders set traps in the corolla to catch bees, and orb-web spiders "wait for bees in their webs."

Other animals are interested in the fruits of bees' labor, such as beehives and honey. Wasps covet the honey stored in beehives, a butterfly called the beehive moth lays its eggs in the beehive, and caterpillars use the cells of vulnerable bee colonies to weave webs. A dipteran insect nicknamed "bee louse" parasitizes bees, especially queen bees, and forces victims to spit out food. The most terrifying is bee spore disease caused by a single-cell organism, and aspergillosis caused by fungi, which can paralyze the respiratory system of bees and cause blindness. Among mammals, bears are honey gourmets.