Moving home: nest-site selection in the Red Dwarf honeybee (Apis florea)

作者：Makinson James C^*; Oldroyd Benjamin P; Schaerf Timothy M; Wattanachaiyingcharoen Wandee; Beekman Madeleine

来源：Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 2011, 65(5): 945-958.

DOI：10.1007/s00265-010-1095-9

• Apis florea
• Nest-site selection
• Group decision-making
• Swarming

The Red Dwarf honeybee (Apis florea) is one of two basal species in the genus Apis. A. florea differs from the well-studied Western Hive bee (Apis mellifera) in that it nests in the open rather than in cavities. This fundamental difference in nesting biology is likely to have implications for nest-site selection, the process by which a reproductive swarm selects a new site to live in. In A. mellifera, workers show a series of characteristic behaviors that allow the swarm to select the best nest site possible. Here, we describe the behavior of individual A. florea workers during the process of nest-site selection and show that it differs from that seen in A. mellifera. We analyzed a total of 1,459 waggle dances performed by 197 scouts in five separate swarms. Our results suggest that two fundamental aspects of the behavior of A. mellifera scouts-the process of dance decay and the process of repeated nest site evaluation-do not occur in A. florea. We also found that the piping signal used by A. mellifera scouts to signal that a quorum has been reached at the chosen site, is performed by both dancing and non-dancing bees in A. florea. Thus, the piping signal appears to serve a different purpose in A. florea. Our results illustrate how differences in nesting biology affect the behavior of individual bees during the nest-site selection process.

• 出版日期2011-5