Mine does. To get her hair and nails done.Does the queen bee ever leave the hive?
The queen bee DOES leave the hive. She goes out on several (usually several) mating flights when she is young, then after she starts to lay eggs does not leave except when the bees swarm. If they swarm, then she goes with the swarm and the hive is left with some bees and queen cells that are mature and ready for the young queen(s) to emerge.
Sometimes there is what is called an ';after swarm'; which is when more bees and a young, not yet mated queen leave after the big primary swarm leaves.
On very rare occasions all the bees including the queen abandon the hive. this is called ';absconding';. It almost never occurs with European honeybees, but does rather often occur with the ';killer';bees (African bees';
The swarm is the reproduction of the bee colony. It is essentially the splitting of the hive. One half stays in the old location with a new, unmated queen. The other half fly off to find a new spot to live. They have the old, mated and egg laying queen.
The original queen never leaves the hive. She produces worker bees which build the hive and basically run things. What happens is once in a while some bees, when they are still in their larval stage, are given a substance called ';royal jelly';, which basically turns them into queen bees while they metamorphize into adult bees. They then leave the hive and go out to establish new hives.
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