Western honey bee Since workers are not fully sexually developed, they do not mate with drones and thus can only produce haploid (male) offspring. Queens and workers have a modified ovipositor, a stinger, with which they defend the hive. Unlike bees of any other genus and the queens of their own species, the stinger of worker honey bees is barbed. Contrary to popular belief, a bee does not always die soon after stinging; this misconception is based on the fact that a bee will usually die after stinging a human or other mammal. The stinger and its venom sac, with musculature and a
Western honey bee regurgitates a droplet of warm internal fluid — a "honeycrop droplet" – which reduces the temperature of its head by . Below bees are immobile, and above their activity slows. Honey bees can tolerate temperatures up to for short periods. Honey-bee behavior has been extensively studied, since bees are widespread and familiar. Karl von Frisch, who received the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his study of honey-bee communication, noticed that bees communicate with dance. Through these dances, bees communicate information regarding the distance, the situation, and the direction of a food source by the dances of the