Yes, male honey bees (called drones) do ejaculate, and the process is one of the most dramatic in the insect world. Ejaculation in drones is explosive, literally. Internal pressure forces the reproductive organ out of the drone’s body with enough force that it can produce an audible pop, and the act kills the drone every time.
How Drone Ejaculation Works
Drones have an internal reproductive organ called the endophallus, which stays tucked inside their abdomen until mating. During copulation, a buildup of internal pressure forces this organ to evert, meaning it turns inside out and extends outward. The process happens in two stages. First, the organ partially everts, but a narrow duct (only 0.4 to 0.5 mm wide) temporarily blocks it from fully extending. Only when pressure builds high enough does the duct widen, allowing the organ to complete its eversion. That final burst of pressure is what propels semen out with considerable force.
The endophallus, once fully everted, is roughly the size of the drone’s own abdomen. The eversion is irreversible. After ejaculation, the organ tears away from the drone’s body, and the drone dies within minutes.
What Drone Semen Contains
Each drone produces a tiny amount of semen, roughly 1 microliter on average, though it can range from 0.1 to 2.4 microliters. That small volume carries between 1.5 and 7.3 million sperm cells, with some estimates reaching up to 19 million per ejaculate. During a successful mating, around 6 to 12 million sperm are transferred into the queen.
Sperm production begins early in a drone’s development. Sperm cells form inside the testes, then migrate into paired storage tubes called seminal vesicles several days before the drone even emerges from its cell as an adult bee. The seminal vesicles begin producing their own secretions around day 20 of the drone’s development, and a separate set of mucus glands spend the first nine days after emergence filling with fluid. During mating, muscular layers surrounding both the seminal vesicles and mucus glands contract simultaneously, forcing everything through a shared duct and out through the endophallus in a single explosive event.
Where and When Mating Happens
Drones only ejaculate during mating flights, which take place high in the air at specific gathering sites called drone congregation areas. Queens fly to these sites and mate with multiple drones in succession during a single flight. A typical nuptial flight lasts about 18 minutes on average, though flights as short as 3 minutes and as long as 57 minutes have been recorded. Queens often take more than two flights per day.
Weather plays a major role. Mating rarely occurs when temperatures drop below 20°C (68°F), when skies are overcast, or when wind speeds exceed 30 km/h (about 19 mph). Warmer temperatures lead to longer flights, which gives queens more time to mate with additional drones.
The Mating Sign Left Behind
When a drone ejaculates and his endophallus tears away, part of it remains lodged in the queen’s reproductive opening. This leftover piece, along with mucus secretions, forms what beekeepers call a “mating sign.” You might expect this plug to block other drones from mating with the queen, but research shows the opposite. In controlled experiments, drones were actually more attracted to queen models that displayed a mating sign than to unmarked models. The plug appears to function as a signal, essentially flagging the queen as a viable mate and helping subsequent drones locate her more quickly during flight. The next drone removes the previous mating sign before depositing his own.
What the Queen Does With the Sperm
After her mating flights are complete, the queen stores sperm in a specialized internal organ called the spermatheca. She initially stores around 6 million sperm cells, drawn from the ejaculates of multiple drones. This single supply has to last her entire reproductive life, which can stretch up to 7 years, giving her the potential to produce an estimated 1.7 million offspring.
The spermatheca isn’t just a passive storage container. The queen’s body actively maintains the sperm through glandular secretions that keep the cells alive and functional over those years. The chemical composition of the spermathecal fluid changes over time: it differs in virgin queens (who are preparing to receive fresh sperm) compared to mated queens who have been storing sperm for months. Ejaculates from different drones coexist within the spermatheca for the queen’s entire life, though researchers still don’t fully understand whether certain drones’ sperm gets preferential use over others.
Ejaculation Outside of Mating
Drones can also ejaculate outside of normal mating, and the circumstances are grim. When drones experience lethal stress, such as extreme heat, they convulse and involuntarily evert their endophallus. Researchers at the University of British Columbia documented this phenomenon during heat events, describing drones as “explosively ejaculating to death.” This stress response has become a concern in regions experiencing more frequent heat waves, as it can kill large numbers of drones before they ever get a chance to mate.