Hello Matthew and All,
I was doing  a post in answer to the bee sting question but my post looked like Matthews so maybe we were  looking at the  same  reference book.   I am puzzled  by  the below  statement  and  am probably  going  to ask a  dumb  question but ask I will.
Matthew wrote:
Honey bees are the only ones that have a barbed stinger and thus are the=
 only ones who die after stinging. Other bees have a smooth stinger and=
 could sting repeatedly if they wanted.
All beekeepers  know the above is  true.  My reference  books say  bees  evolved  from wasps. The  question I ponder  is  why  a  worker   bee stinger  is  barbed  and the   queen  is not.  The  queen has a smooth stinger  and   could   sting over and over  though I have handled thousands  of queens  without an  offer to sting. Does the  diet of Royal Jelly  change the sting  from barbed  to  smooth? Would a slight increase in royal jelly create  a worker with a  smooth stinger?  Is the worker honey bee stinger barbed because  the  worker   ovipositor  is not  fully developed? Is the queen ovipositor   smooth because  with the correct  diet her ovipositor  is  fully  developed?
I  guess I will survive not knowing the answers to the above questions but maybe  others on the list might comment.
Sincerely,
Bob Harrison