Vulture bee

Vulture Bee
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Hymenoptera
Suborder:	Apocrita
Superfamily:	Apoidea
Family:	Apidae
Subfamily:	Apinae
Tribe:	Meliponini
Genus:	Trigona
Subgenus:	(Trigona)
Species
three species; see text

Vulture bees are a small group of three closely related American stingless bee species in the genus Trigona which feed on rotting meat rather than pollen or nectar. These are the only known bees which do not rely on plant products for food. This unusual behavior was only discovered in 1982, nearly two centuries after the bees were first classified. The three species in this group are:

Trigona crassipes (Fabricius, 1793)
Trigona necrophaga (Camargo & Roubik, 1991)
Trigona hypogea

• Trigona hypogea robustior (Schwarz, 1948)
• Trigona hypogea hypogea (Silvestri, 1902)

Vulture bees, much like maggots, usually enter the carcass through the eyes. They will then root around inside gathering the meat suitable for their needs. The vulture bee salivates on the rotting flesh and then consumes it, storing the flesh in its special stomach compartment. When it returns to the hive, this meat is vomited and processed by a worker bee, which breaks the meat down into an edible substance resembling honey. This substance is then placed into pot-like containers within the hive until it is time to feed the immature bees.

References

• Roubik, D.W. (1982). "Obligate Necrophagy in a Social Bee". Science 217 (4564): 1059–60.
• Camargo, J.M.F. & Roubik, D.W. (1991). (link broken)"Systematics and bionomics of the apoid obligate necrophages: the Trigona hypogea group". Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 44 (1): 13–39.