German bee
- noun
- Specialized
:
abeja alemana
- Because the German bee is known for being ill-tempered, it requires careful handling during extraction.
Examples
-
Although she was only a common American mixture of the German bee, she compared most favorably with the more regal strain of Italian bees he had reared in his village.
Fiction book (1993) -
Many local beekeepers prefer the German bee for its ability to thrive in colder climates.
-
The beekeeper decided to introduce a German bee hive to improve honey production based on its hardiness.
Synonyms
A dark honeybee from northern Europe that can be defensive around its hive
How Aggressive
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is a simple adjectival modifier ('German') + noun ('bee'), so a B1 learner who knows both words will readily infer it denotes a type or variety of bee associated with Germany. Specific attributes like colour or temperament are additional lexical information not predictable from the components, but the basic referential meaning is transparently derived from the constituents.
Etymology
German bee comes from 19th-century beekeepers who bred a dark, strong bee in Germany. Because these bees were harder to handle and more defensive, the name came to mean a tough, sometimes bad-tempered variety used in beekeeping.