Each bee caste follows a different aging-rate model. Workers accumulate oxidative wing/flight-muscle damage while foraging, dramatically shortening summer lifespan; winter bees barely forage and live months. Queens are fed only royal jelly and rarely leave the hive, giving them a completely different aging curve.
workerLife ≈ 6 weeks (summer forager) vs 20+ weeks (winter bee)
agingRate_worker ∝ foragingWorkload
queenLife ≈ 2-5 years (nearly workload-independent)
- Time speed — simulated days per real second, so you can watch whole lifespans pass.
- Foraging workload — how hard workers are flying/foraging; higher workload accelerates worker aging (oxidative stress model).
- Season — winter bees do little foraging and physiologically age far slower than summer foragers.
- Run / Reset — starts, pauses, or restarts all three age counters together for direct comparison.
Real application: beekeepers time colony splits and queen replacement around these known lifespan curves to keep populations healthy year-round.