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It's a beautiful day, there's blue sky and clouds above you. Do you ever wish, as a person,
you could fly up there and join the birds and the bees that are having such a great
time? I'm Janice Creneti, and this is How Do Bees Fly? Well, flight is something that's
fascinated humans for years, and it's something that we've studied in animals as a way to
try to create it for ourselves. Well, we've created airplanes and kites and hang-gliders
and all sorts of things that allow us to get up in the air and get the experience of flying.
But what about a bee? How do they actually fly? If you look at some of your honeybees,
they're not terribly streamlined. They're kind of round and heavy, and it looks like
it might be difficult for them to get up in the air. So what's the trick? Well the trick
is, they beat their wings really, really, really quickly. So quickly, in fact, that
it's kind of hard to see, sort of like if you've ever watched a hummingbird try to fly.
So, they can use those very fast wing beats to stay up in the air. Now, they need a lot
of fast wing beats just to get up to begin with, and to do that hovering thing that they'll
do when they're sitting over top of a flower, trying to decide whether it's a good place
to land to get some food. In order for them to move, they have to beat their wings even
faster. And scientists are really amazed, in fact, at how fast they're able to beat
those wings. But they do, and that's what gets them from flower to flower, which is
great, because it means that we have honey. I'm Janice Creneti, and this is How Do Bees
Fly?