One of my favorite things about beekeeping is that you can tell what time of year it is and what type of weather we will have by observing the bees. When last visiting my apiary, I heard a lot of abnormally loud and low buzzing. I walked over to the front of one of my langstroth hives to see lots of drones or male bees flying out of the entrance. Male bees often make a low droning sound which helps support their namesake. Following the drones, were many sister bees escorting and sometimes dragging out the male drone bees. In the fall, the sister bees begin to kick out (sometimes literally) the drone bees. The sister bees remove their brothers from the hive out of necessity.
The fall and winter can be a very difficult time of year for the bees. They are doing their best to stay warm and conserve as much honey as possible, because honey serves as their food source for winter. The drones do not share the work in the hive as the sister bees do, and are not needed in the winter for mating. Unfortunately, this means that the sister bees, aggressively in some cases, kick the drones out of the hive before winter. The drones have nowhere to go, and so they die. My silly dog Reishi, has learned this behavior from the bees, and when it gets cold she goes around the hive eating the drones that get kicked out. I have also noticed the birds take this opportunity to fatten up on the drone bees’ protein for winter. In the image, you will see the drone bee has a larger set of eyes, is less colorful and has a larger body.