# How is it that a Bee can fly? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 12, 2004, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559 "2004-04-12T04:09:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Starguard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Starguard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starguard)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/1 "2004-04-12T04:09:06Z")
I’ve been told numerous times that according to the laws of physics, it is physically impossible for a bee to be able to fly. It has something to do with the overall weight and mass of its body, in co-relation to the width of its wings and their location along its back. Physics supposedly prove this to be impossible, but yet we all know that they can fly very well. Has anyone else here ever heard of this, and if so, has a solution to this theory been found? ---
**Author:** ![Hunter\_Hawk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/50afbb/32.png) [@Hunter\_Hawk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hunter_Hawk)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/2 "2004-04-12T04:12:40Z")
The short answer is, bees can’t fly per the physics of fixed-wing aircraft. Conviently enough, bees don’t happen to have fixed wings. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/3 "2004-04-12T04:54:31Z")
Actually, it is not bees (honey bees) that are supposed to be unable to fly, but bumblebees, specifically. (Although, I would guess you could throw carpenter bees into the category, based on weight vs wing size.) Given that all bees do fly, “science” is not going to be so foolish as to declare that they cannot. [This site](http://www.iop.org/news/0012i.1) claims that a(n unnamed) Swiss engineer first “calculated” that bumblebees could not fly, then links to Ken Zetie’s [demonstration of the capacity of bees to fly](http://www.wolfson.ox.ac.uk/~ben/zetie1.htm). ---
**Author:** ![manhattan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manhattan/32/7_2.png) [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/4 "2004-04-12T05:05:21Z")
[This guy](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a5_045.html) has a knack for explaining stuff like this to folks like you and me, and in this instance even includes the same link that **tomndebb** found. ---
**Author:** ![TheLoadedDog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/35a633/32.png) [@TheLoadedDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheLoadedDog)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/5 "2004-04-12T05:26:05Z")
I’ve heard the same thing about the pelican. ---
**Author:** ![Bret](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8baadc/32.png) [@Bret](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bret)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/6 "2004-04-12T17:58:51Z")
Apparently, flying “objects” with non-fixed wings, such as insects, are able to fly more efficiently than those with fixed-wings. If this is the case, I wonder why we have not adapted this type of flight in our aircraft? My guess is that it would probably be a ROUGH ride! It would make for a preaty neat toy r/c plane though! ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/7 "2004-04-12T23:35:56Z")
Ever hear of helicopters, Bret? ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2004, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/8 "2004-04-13T04:24:09Z")
If there were only one way to fly, skeptics would be correct. But there’s more than one way to fly. An airplane designer who looked at the rotors of a helicopter and said “The way those wings are designed, this thing can’t possibly fly” would be correct only in the strictest sense: those rotors WOULDN’T work as airplane wings. But they do the job in a different way. A bumblebee’s wings work just fine- they just don’t work the same way an eagle’s wings do. And that suits the bumblebee fine! Her method of flight allows her to hover over a flower while she collects pollen- something she couldn’t do with bird-like wings. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2004, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-it-that-a-bee-can-fly/239559/9 "2004-04-13T04:33:23Z")
There’s a difference between honey bees and bumblebees? And between them and carpenter bees? Wtf? I thought there were only regular bees and killer bees. However, I did know that killer bees were the same as regular bees, only on steroids. 😉