Is it true that a hive is made up of male and female bees?

She is the only reproductive bee, the rest are workers that have various “jobs” to support the colony. I don’t know how a new queen is chosen in the event of the old queens death.

Bees are fantastic. I have a 3 yr. old hive/colony that lives in a giant oak tree hollow in my yard. I give them showers in the summer with my garden hose. They love it! I mist all the branches in the tree around their hive and they also drink from a birdbath in my yard. :-)

Thanks, @Coloma, I watched a video on youtube“Dan’s Bees” last night that showed a man had ordered nine thousand bees (small hive) the queen was shipped in a solitary compartment. She was longer than the other bees and easily recognizable. He said the first queen bee didn’t make it so he had to order another one. Very interesting.

The worker bees are all females. There are a small number of male bees, referred to as drones. As the name suggests, they do not do much, only compete to mate with the queen.

Well, I only saw a documentary about bees, but my understanding of it is that there are other female bees, and they give birth to regular bees, while the queen gives birth to other queen bees.