At 10:49 AM 5/4/02 -0400, you wrote:

The weight of a European worker bee has been reported as ranging from 0.89
mg/bee to slightly over 0.1 gm (wet weight).  Obviously, the weight varies
by race, beekeeper, and type of bee - smoked, unsmoked, age, etc.  We've
weighed and counted lots of bees, can even provide the variance.

For the latter, figure 10-12 flight days (sunny, flowers in abundance) as
the life span of the average forager - based on work from Germany, this
number appears again and again if you carefully examine other work.
Estimate 6-8 flights per day for nectar gatherers (could be more -- water
carriers make 50 or more trips -- depends on how far the bees have to go,
how rich the source, etc.)  Figure 75 - 90 mg loads of nectar in the crop
for each trip -- I suspect the lower number is more representative.  Now,
estimate the amount of water driven off the nectar while making honey.


>I'm looking for an estimate of the average weight of a European worker
bee, and also for some
>back-up for  the assertion, seen elsewhere, that in their lifetime a
worker will produce about 1/12
>of a teaspoon of honey.
>/Curtis Crowell
>
>