Workers are all sterile females and do all the different tasks needed to maintain and operate the hive, like comb construction, brood rearing (broods arise either from fertilized eggs representing potential queens or workers or unfertilized eggs representing prospective drones), tending the queen and drones, cleaning, temperature regulation and defending the hive when they are young and foraging
outside the hive to gather nectar, pollen, water and certain sticky plant resins used in hive construction when they are older