Brian Nelson, age 11, of Newport Beach, Calif., for his question:
WHAT ARE CARPENTER BEES?
There are 10,000 different species of bees, and they can be found in almost every part of the world except the North and South Poles. They gather pollen and nectar from flowers on many fruits and vegetables. Bees are important.
Bees are divided into two major groups: the social bees, who live in colonies, and the solitary bees, who live alone.
Among the social bees are the famous honeybees. They live in colonies that may have as few as 10 members or as many as 80,000. Each colony includes one queen, who lays the eggs; many workers, who gather food and care for the young, and lots of drones, who have the function of mating with the colony's queen or a young queen.
Most bees in the world fall into the solitary group. They live alone although sometimes thousands may gather in a rather small area and build their nests close together. But solitary bees do not depend on each other.
The carpenter bee is one of the solitary species. He can be from about a quarter of an inch long up to a full inch. He builds his nest in dead twigs or branches.
A female carpenter bee will dig her own tunnel home. She will then put pollen and nectar at the bottom and lay an egg on top of the stored food.
A female carpenter bee has strong, sharp jaws and can easily dig her tunnel into the wood. She spreads tiny bits of wood chips that are cemented together with saliva across the top of the cell. This ceiling acts as a floor for a cell above, so that the tunnel becomes filled with a series of cells, each holding a bit of food and one egg.
There are no worker bees among the solitary group. Each female is like a queen and must do her own work. After she has laid her eggs and sealed the last cell, the carpenter bee flies away. Her eggs hatch in a few weeks and the larvae, which come out of the eggs, live on the pollen and nectar. In a few days they work themselves out of the tunnel.
Other important solitary bees include the leaf cutter bees, the miners, masons and cockoo bees. Leaf cutters use pieces of leaves to make egg cells in nests. Mining bees build their tunnels in the ground and masons construct their tunnels in either decaying wood or in small, discarded shells.
Cockoo bees seem unable to build their own nests and cannot gather food for their young. They solve the problem by laying their eggs in the nests of other solitary bees.