When thousands of drones are flying in a DCA, they flood the area with drone mandibular pheromone³, which attracts queens on their nuptial flights. When a queen enters a DCA, the drones are attracted to her pheromones and quickly begin a chase. They trail each other, their flight paths resembling long lines of drafting bicyclists, and form a comet of hundreds of drones. The first to reach her will mate. Copulation takes only seconds, during which the drone’s endophallus rips from his body and he falls to his death.⁴ His endophallus is left inside the queen’s sting chamber, but not for long as another drone will shortly follow.

It has long been thought that queens mate with around 12 drones but new studies show that the average number of matings is closer to 50⁵. Multiple matings of queens is key to the health of the colony, as genetic diversity provides nuanced traits that will help the colony to thrive.^6,7 A queen’s nuptial mating flights are completed in a day or two, after which she has enough semen (~5,000,000 sperm)⁸ stored in an organ called the spermatheca, to last her lifetime. A few days after her return, she commences her life’s work as an egg laying machine.

Drones live about 21-32 days, and are raised in times of plenty – in the spring when the nectar is flowing and in summer months when the colony can support them. If a colony falls on hard times – nectar dearth, drought, sustained poor weather – and they can’t spare food for drones, the workers will keep the drones from entering the hive, essentially starving them out. By the time fall rolls around, the honey bee colony expels any remaining drones because mating season is over, and their services are no longer needed. Colony survival in the winter months depends on conserving the colony’s stored honey, and drones are a drain on resources. Come spring, the colony will rear new drones.

Mysteriously, the new drones find the same DCAs year after year, even though no old drones survived the winter. Without intergenerational learning, how do drones know where the DCAs are?