Coping with nonrepairable body damage: effects of wing damage on foraging performance in bees
Nonrepairable body damage such as tooth and wing wear commonly occur in animals and can dramatically alter their behaviour. We critically examined the effects of nonrepairable damage in a model system that enabled us to separate the effects of damage from other correlated effects of senescence. Compared to sham controls, honeybees with 20% of their […]
Communication signals used in worker-drone interactions in the honeybee, Apis mellifera
Although the use of communication signals during worker-queen interactions in honeybees have been studied in detail, signals involved in worker-drone interactions have received less attention. We determined whether workers perform piping and the vibration signal on drones, and whether drones respond in ways that potentially enhance their mating success. Workers did not produce piping on […]
Public use of olfactory information associated with predation in two species of social bees
Recent studies have documented that social bees can use heterospecific information to find or avoid food resources, but little is known about whether bees gain information from heterospecifics about predation risk. We report the first detailed field tests in bees of hetero- and conspecific avoidance of olfactory information associated with predation. We determined whether Apis […]