Updated by: Arabinda Naik
Honeybees use a haplodiploid sex determination mechanism. In honeybees, the male is haploid while the female is diploid Queens and worker bees are produced from fertilised honeybee eggs, which are diploid and have two sets of chromosomes. Male insects are haploid because they develop partheno-genetically from unfertilized eggs. The male progeny of honeybees develops naturally from unfertilised eggs, which are haploid and have only one set of chromosomes. The phenomenon is called arrhenotoky. Meiosis does not occur during the formation of sperms. Females grow from fertilized eggs and are hence diploid. Queen bee picks up all the sperms from the drone during nuptial flight and stores the same in her seminal vesicle. Formation of worker bees (diploid females) and drones (haploid males) depends upon the brood cells visited by the queen. While visiting the smaller brood cells, the queen emits sperms from its seminal receptacle over the eggs. As it visits the larger brood cells it lays the eggs, but the seminal receptacles fail to emit the sperms due to low pressure. An offspring formed from the union of a sperm and an egg develops as a female, and an unfertilized egg develops as a male. This means that the male has half number of chromosomes that a female has and are diploid. A male has no father and cannot have sons, but he has a grandfather and can have grandsons. In honeybee, the drones males are entirely derived from the queen, their mother. The diploid Queen has 32 chromosomes, and the haploid drones have 16 chromosomes. Drones produce sperm cells by mitosis. The male bees genetic makeup is therefore entirely derived from the mother, while the genetic makeup of the female worker bees is half derived from the mother, and half derived from the father. Those female larvae which are throughout fed on a richer diet of royal jelly develops into Queen while others develop into workers.