drone Feb '18

The voice of reason, my spouse, captured this iPhone photo on February 24th.  My attempts at putting my eyes and two hands into a line resulted in poorly composed or out of focus photos.  The abundance of spring drone bees is an urgent reminder to prepare my tree hanging swarm traps.

white eyed drone bee

Although I know about white eyed drones from reading First Lessons in Beekeeping, my first live encounter took me by surprise.  I thought to myself, what kind of new insect is peering up between the frames and why would I want to investigate a new question - I already have a long list of hive inspection goals.

Glenn Apiaries has a discussion of inherited recessive genes and their expression in drone offspring   As I found just one drone bee with white eyes.  So, I will (for now) conclude his sightless white eyes are a mutation and not an inherited condition.

drone bee

I found a drone bee for my politely bee interested friends.  The drone did not fly away and was determined to walk forward.  My friends kept extending a new hand to keep the drone in view.  I think drone handling makes for great re-programming of the adult brain.   Half of the brain understands that the drone does not sting while the other half of the brain operates with older insect prejudices.