Bug FAQAsian Honey Bee
Apis cerana · Order: Hymenoptera · Family: Apidae
Also called: Asiatic Honey Bee, Eastern Honey Bee, Honey Bee
Source: Wikipedia
Asian honey bees are black with four yellow abdominal stripes and have long hairs covering their eyes. They build multi-comb nests in small-entrance cavities and are native to a wide region of South, Southeast and East Asia. Workers collect pollen with a pollen press on their hind legs and possess a stinger, while drones lack a stinger.
Source: Wikipedia
How to recognize it
Adults have long, erect hairs over the compound eyes, a strongly convex scutellum, and a jugal lobe on the hindwing.
Source: Wikipedia
Size
Adults are black with four yellow abdominal stripes.
Source: Wikipedia
Does it bite or sting?
Worker bees have a pollen press on the hind leg and a stinger instead of an egg-laying organ. Drones have larger eyes, no stinger, and a blunter abdomen.
Source: Wikipedia
Where it lives
Colonies build nests of several combs in cavities with a small entrance for defense. Their range stretches from Primorsky Krai in Russia to eastern Indonesia, and from Japan to the highlands of Afghanistan.
Source: Wikipedia
What it eats
They feed mainly on pollen and nectar, which they turn into honey. They are highly social honey bees.
Source: Wikipedia
Life cycle
A queen typically mates with ten or more drones. The only other reproductive members are male drones, whose sole role is to mate with the queen and then die.
Source: Wikipedia
Where it comes from
They are native to South, Southeast and East Asia.
Source: Wikipedia
Lookalikes
Their physical traits are very similar to other Apis species. They are the sister species of Apis koschevnikovi and share a subgenus with the western honey bee, Apis mellifera.
Source: Wikipedia
Where it is found in the US
Recorded in 2 of 51 states and DC. Most records: Pennsylvania, Oregon.
Darker = more records. Counts are museum and citizen-science records, not population size.
Source: GBIF
Questions people ask
Do Asian honey bees sting?
Yes, worker bees have a stinger and can sting people, causing mild pain.
Source: Wikipedia
What do Asian honey bees look like?
They are black with four yellow abdominal stripes and have long hairs covering their eyes.
Source: Wikipedia
Where are Asian honey bees native to?
They are native to South, Southeast and East Asia, including countries such as China, India, Japan, and Indonesia.
Source: Wikipedia
How do Asian honey bees build their nests?
They construct nests with multiple combs inside cavities that have a small entrance for protection.
Source: Wikipedia
Same family (Apidae)
Sources
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apis_cerana
Look it up elsewhere: GBIF · iNaturalist · BugGuide · ITIS · Wikipedia
Text written 2026-10-23 from the sources above and checked sentence by sentence against them. Data fetched 2026-10-22.