Bones tells Booth, "Without the Drones, the Hive would Die."
While Hive is a common phrase in the general public, an anthropologist would not use the term Hive to refer to the group.
A "colony" is a collective organism made up of a single bee family, consisting of one queen, drones, and thousands of worker honeybees, while a "bee hive" is the structure that houses them.
In a place like the Jeffersonian, a lip ring would not have been acceptable. Fisher would have had to take his lip ring out in such a professional work area.
In the diner, Booth seems surprised when Brennan tells him about the stapler. However, a few sentences later, he says that his guys are searching the office for it.
Brennan states a set of criteria by which Booth would be considered a drone. She says he has superiors to whom he must report, protocols he must follow, and all of his actions are documented and reviewed.
While she claims to be an independent contractor, those same criteria would categorize her as a drone in the Jeffersonian Hive. As an independent contractor without the Jeffersonian, she would be a Queen without a colony.