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| Vulture Bees, Meat-eating Bees |
Vulture Bees, Meat-eating Bees. Bee, that is the name of an insect which is famous for its habit of flying around flowers. It is not without reason that bees have this behavior.
Vulture Bees, Meat-eating Bees
Bees must collect nectar from flowers so that later the nectar can be processed into honey which is then consumed by all members of the bee colony. But that behavior doesn't apply to farmed bees, a type of social bee with a very unusual food-gathering behavior.
The Vulture Bee or in scientific language Trigona hypogea is a species of stingless bee from Central and South America that got its name because it lives on the carcass of vertebrates - similar to vultures.
A little information about the stingless bee, the bee got the name because the bee in question does not have a sting. There are many species of stingless bees that have been identified by humans. In the ladder of scientific classification, all stingless bee species are classified into the Meliponini family.
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| Vulture Bees, Meat-eating Bees |
Due to their foraging and meat gathering habits, Vulture Bees have several important physical differences when compared to other types of herbivorous bees.
The hind legs of Vulture Bees are not equipped with baskets, which are used for attaching and transporting pollen from flowers while flying. In contrast, Vulture Bees have a pair of jaws that are serrated like those of an ant. Suitable for grating and chewing meat.
So how do Vulture Bees collect food? Initially, Vulture Bees will fly in search of carcasses by relying on their sense of sight and smell.
When a bee finds a carcass, it lands on the carcass it finds, releasing smelly compounds called pheromones.
Not long after, the scent of these pheromones will be smelled by the nest mates so that they then fly in groups to the carcass where the bees perch. And it's time to say it's party time.
Together eat carrion
Like other scavenger insects, Vulture Bees feed on carrion from the inside and outside. Bees that gnaw the carcass from the inside enter the carcass through the opening of the eye socket.
Vulture Bees are industrious animals and swarms of these bees can gnaw at the carcass, leaving only the bones. The time it takes for a Vulture Bee to finish a carcass varies because it depends on the size of the carcass.
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| Vulture Bees, Meat-eating Bees |
For example, a frog carcass measuring 4 centimeters can be consumed in six hours. Meanwhile, large lizard carcasses take two days to be gnawed away until the bones remain.
Vulture Bees have a unique relationship with ants of the genus Crematogaster when consuming the same carcass.
If the Vulture Bees congregate on the carcass, the ants will escape even if the ants find them first. New ants gather on the same carcass when it gets dark and Vulture Bees stop their activities outside the hive.
Apart from carcasses, Vulture Bees also want to eat the eggs and larvae of wasps from the nest that their owner has left behind. The Vulture Bee shreds the flesh with its jaws and then swallows it.
The pieces of meat are then stored in one of its stomachs. When they arrive at the hive, the Vulture Bees will regurgitate their stomach contents into the digestive tracts of other Vulture Bees.
This process is repeated until the meat is melted into a pulp. If this is the case, then the next thing that Vulture Bees do is regurgitate the pulp into the nest space which is shaped like a pot so that it can be stored and given to other nest inhabitants, such as bee larvae. By: Ochie
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