Unnamed Stingerless Bee Colony

Mikey Bustos plans on starting beekeeping in 2021, starting with a nest of Singerless Bees (Tetragonula biroi). Bees are similar to ants in that part of the Hymenoptera family of insects, which consists of ants, bees, and wasps, meaning they have two pairs of wings (four in total) and at least one queen, though worker ants have no wings and are the exemption to the wing classification. The particular species Mikey plans to keep would be native to the Philippines, like his ants, and are around the size of a grain of rice. He is currently asking for names for the community to vote on.

These bees create hives in old bamboo and wood, making a hive with multiple entrances, called a labyrinth entrance. This is to confuse their mortal enemies, ants. Any ant that gets lost either gets eaten or carried off to protect the hive, though this method is not always successful. The labyrinth entrance is designed to keep the queen, the food, and the young bees safe.

Like ants, Stingerless Bees allow only the oldest bees out of the hive to gather food and pollen, as well as to cool down or heat up the hive, depending on the temperature. These bees also develop dense balls of pollen on their legs called pollen baskets (Corbiculae) as they go to gather nectar. Inside the hive, the young bees care for the queen, babysit the larva and eggs, and build up the nest and take care of internal repairs.

Stingerless bees are also small enough to get into flowerettes and improve the quality of fruits, such as mangos and coconuts. As of right now, Mikey doesn't know what flowering plants and fruit trees to place around the outside of the Ant House that is currently being built but plans on there being enough to support one or more hives. He also plans on trying to create a hive that would support the introduction of a camera to allow his viewers to see what the colony does inside the hive.