Drone (bee)

A drone is a male honey bee. Unlike the female worker bee, a drone has no stinger. It does not gather nectar or pollen and cannot feed without assistance from worker bees. Its only role is to mate with a maiden queen in nuptial flight, and often dies after doing so.

Genetics

Drones carry only one type of allele at each chromosomal position, because they are haploid (containing only one set of chromosomes from the mother). During the development of eggs within a queen, a diploid cell with 32 chromosomes divides to generate haploid cells called gametes with 16 chromosomes. The result is a haploid egg, with chromosomes having a new combination of alleles at the various loci. This process is called arrhenotokous parthenogenesis or simply arrhenotoky.

Because the male bee technically has only a mother, and no father, their genealogical tree is unusual. The first generation has one member (the male). One generation back also has one member (the mother). Two generations back are two members (the mother and father of the mother). Three generations back are three members. Four back are five members. This sequence – 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, and so on – is the Fibonacci sequence.