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Date: | Fri, 8 Nov 2019 21:09:38 -0500 |
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Hi all
I was dismayed to read in the article that:
> Honeybee colonies contain three distinct castes. Each colony contains sterile worker bees, a single reproductive female queen bee, and males called drones
While the term "caste" has many connotations, in entomology it should be clear that males and females are different sexes, not different castes.
> "Caste system" in social insects refers to the fact that the members of the colony can be divided into fertile sexual and specialized infertile individuals, such as workers and soldiers, which in most cases are females incapable of reproducing. The social hymenopterans have only female castes, which, for instance in ants, are usually characterized both by form and function.
Engels, Wolf (ed.) 1990: Social insects. An evolutionary approach to castes and reproduction. 264 pp. Springer-Verlag. Berlin. ISBN 3-540-50812-0.
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