[5] They are also known for their small body size, reduced wing venation, and highly developed social structure comparable to honey bees.

Some of these similarities are co-operative brood care, and having different castes of queens, workers, and drones.

The male drones have very similar bodies and wing lengths, but can be identified by different antennae.

The entrance and surrounding areas of their nest are coated with a smooth, thick layer of black, red, or yellow cerumen or propolis, a material formed by mixing beeswax (a glandular secretion of worker bees) with resin (collected from plants).

[10] They lack external entrance tunnels, but do build internal entrance tunnels where guard bees patrol, looking out for any intruders (including Small Hive Beetle, Phorid Fly, and other bees).

They tend to choose larger trees and wider cavities to produce insulation valuable for their survival in the cool regions.

Some features that would favour survival in a cooler climate are a high tree height and large feeding pots.

Members of T. carbonaria also create the largest honey and pollen pots compared to the other species of the genus Tetragonula, which may help with efficient food storage.

[6] In urban and suburban areas, T. carbonaria have been found to nest in Telstra pits as well as water meters when other habitat is not available.

The daily activity period, however, is longer in the southern hemisphere's warmer months, October to March.

[3] This year-long period of activity is beneficial for the pollination of crops flowering at any time of the year.

He recorded that colony weight increased much more in spring and summer compared to autumn and winter.

[15] The rate at which colony weight increases is dependent on the availability of nectar and pollen, not age (however, it usually takes 12 to 18 months for a hive to be ready to be propagated).

Workers spread out in all directions surrounding the colony, and quickly locate the best option nearest the nest.

Marking is used as a guide to make the location easier to find for their nest mates.

Another possibility could be some sort of "evolutionary arms race" between workers and queens over which the caste has power to produce males.

Some cases are seen of diploid males, which are generally sterile and are considered to have a very low fitness.

In some extreme cases, workers have been reported to kill a queen producing diploid males, to help the future success of the colony.

Queen-worker conflict is found in cell provisioning and the oviposition process of most stingless bee species.

[22] This conflict is usually very elaborate, and very apparent, but tends to not involve acts of aggression, which other species of stingless bees have been known to perform.

This is where the queen patrols the area where new brood cells are being produced, being able to have a hands-on policing which tends to be quite effective.

The signal to form this cloud is most likely mediated by alarm pheromones, which workers release from their mandibular glands.

[16] As one entity, they drop to the ground and wrestle the intruders, which often leads to death of both parties.

[16] T. carbonaria bees are highly sensitive to intruders, since they will even attack invaders that are carrying pollen or nectar.

However, Australian native bees are able to detect and avoid flowers harbouring crab spiders despite the fact that they are initially attracted to them.

[23] The braconid subfamily Euphorinae has several genera, including Syntretus, known to be parasitoids of the adult stage of insects.

Females of S. trigonaphagus are frequently found at the entrances of T. carbonaria hives near Queensland, Australia.

The workers repeatedly brush their abdomens afterwards, suggesting that they were aware that an attack occurred.

T. carbonaria is the main species from which beekeepers harvest honey, of the stingless bees in Australia.

Beekeepers report that one of the major limiting factors in propagating colonies is the availability of queens.