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View this X/Twitter post from @sciencegirl published on 2026년 5월 24일 오전 10:43. This post contains 2 videos and 1 images.
On hot days, bees position themselves at the entrance of their hive and use their wings as fans drawing warm air out and allowing cooler air to move in 1/🧵 📹Flohive
2/🧵 Honeybee hives are cooled through a combination of natural convection and active ventilation created by the bees themselves. Warm air inside the hive naturally rises because it is less dense, while cooler outside air tends to move in to replace it when openings are available. The bees enhance this process by positioning themselves near the entrance and other parts of the nest and fanning their wings in a coordinated way. Many of these bees face the hive entrance while fanning. This orientation allows them to more effectively control airflow at the main point of exchange between inside and outside air. By facing inward, they can help draw fresh air into the hive, while other bees positioned differently can help push warm, humid air out. This creates a continuous circulation of air through the nest rather than random movement. 📹Jacob Peters
3/🧵 Whilst bees may fan for several reasons the bees in this video are doing it for ventilation. That is because their abdomen is lower, sometime bees fan at the entrance of the hive, fanning a pheromone called the nasonov pheromone to help orientate forager bees back to the hive. When they do this they position themselves with abdomen up, you can see the scent gland here Like this Honey bee posture during emission of pheromone from Nasonov gland at upper tip of abdomen • Photo by Pollinator, April 2003, South Carolina.
