The queen bee, surrounded by several females, on the brood cells, which for this bee, the Melipona seminigra pernigra, are built horizontally. The melipones are social bees; the colonies bring together 500 to 2000 bees and the queen bees sometimes have to ask with insistence to be fed, beating their wings to demand it. Contrary to domestic bee Apis mellifera, there may be several virgin queens in a melipone bee colony, but still with only one laying eggs.