How do bees find their way back home? How do bees find their way home? Several common versions of How bees can navigate in cloudy weather
Why do bees dance, how do they find a hive by smell and where is magnetite located in their brain - each question has practical significance. Answers are given with the source indicated.
People on the streets were asked how bees find their way home. Most of them answered “by smell.” In second place was the answer “from memory.” A biologist would answer “by the Sun” or “by the landscape of the area.” Perhaps all factors will be effective. But the action depends on the weather.
How can bees navigate in cloudy weather?
Let the air humidity be high and the pressure be low. Then the odors spread poorly. It is believed that in such conditions, bees navigate by the Sun and the map of the landscape. The map is drawn up when flying for a bribe.
Collecting pollen in autumn
The Sun has its own principle, and it does not depend on the weather. The rays of natural light are always polarized, and bees have polarizing vision. The same applies to most insects.
It is unlikely that orientation by sound is possible in cloudy weather. But sound is the main element in the communication system.
Which bees find their way home?
There are three types of honey bees: worker, queen, and drone. Genetically, the first two are one and the same. Drones are the worst at navigating the terrain:
- 5-10 drones were carried on honeycombs 2 km from the hive. Everyone returned;
- 3-3.5 km – only some individuals returned;
- 4 km - everyone got lost.
Working individuals of Ukrainian steppe bees collect honey 5 km from the hive. In reality, the flight range is greater.
The queen bee moves 5-10 km away from the hive. True, she needs to perform an approximate flight.
Queen Buckfast
- If a person is near the hive when taking off on an approximate flight, you have to wait 7-10 minutes. Otherwise, the queen bee will not find her hive.
- Until 22:30, that is, until the flights are completed, the hives cannot be moved even a meter.
The second tip applies to worker bees.
Orienting bees
If the hives are placed among the trees, the bees get lost. So the apiary is located in a clearing, on the border with a forest, etc. You can’t make an apiary in lowlands where fog accumulates.
Forest apiary
Flights over bodies of water often end unsuccessfully. The reason is the presence of glare.
According to natural navigator
IN nervous system Magnetite crystals were found among honey bees. They are connected to nerve endings. The entire system operates so precisely that an analogy can be drawn with a GPS navigator.
Magnetic map of the Earth
The error is the same 60-80 cm by which the hive can be moved.
A magnetic field is a vector that has direction and intensity. So we are not talking about a compass, but about a functioning natural navigator.
According to the Sun
The physics course continues: we need to remember what polarized light and a polarizing crystal are.
Crystalline spar
If you look at the Sun through Iceland spar, you can see a bright point or black spot. However, by turning the crystal 90 degrees, you can notice changes: the spot has turned into a luminous point, and vice versa. The effect is also used in insect vision.
- The hive is covered with an opaque cap with a window where the Polaroid is installed;
- By changing the angle of polarization of light, the rotation of the bees' dances is observed at the corresponding angle.
Modern navigation systems determine the position of the Sun even at dusk. The principle used is the same as that used by bees. The system continues to work when the star goes 6-7% below the horizon. These numbers are also typical for insects.
To be precise, light is polarized clear skies. And the Sun emits unpolarized light.
By smell
Above we discussed how bees find their way home over a considerable distance. They smell flowers at a distance of 0.8-0.9 km. The distance to recognize the hive by smell will be even shorter.
Marker gland
Nasonov's glands are located on the abdomen of the queen bee and all workers. They, these glands, produce a substance that serves as a marker of a family or swarm.
A mistake in choosing a hive is excluded by nature. But theft is possible: visits to other people's hives are not prohibited.
Landscape orientation
Bees navigate by the Sun or magnetic field. And in the works of Randolph Menzel it was proven that the landscape also serves as a source of information: a mental map is built in the insect’s head. If the chart and the position of the Sun conflict, then only the Sun is ignored. Some objects are not taken into account when constructing a map - a rough diagram is built.
The map of the route traveled is stored in memory for 3-4 days. It contains information about the terrain, bodies of water and individual landmarks, such as a lonely tree.
Flying in the maze
The maximum volume of one card is designed for 10-12 km. However, in the forest, where there are many objects, the distance is reduced by half or three times.
Biocommunication system
In addition to the marker substance, communication uses two methods of transmission: dance and sound. The hearing organ is located on the joints of the legs, and the “voice” should be low. Bass is 300 Hertz, and bees talk in the range of 250-500.
Sound signals
Honey bees have a perfect way of transmitting sound. Example:
- The hive is destroyed - bursts every 2-3 seconds (up to 10 minutes);
- Hive ventilation – basic sound (250 Hz) with a large number overtones (ringing);
- A honey plant has been found - a sequence of sounds that become longer as the distance to the honey plant increases (photo).
The queen bee, when leaving the queen cell, makes a “fanfare”: a long signal - a pause - a short signal.
There are two types of dances - circular and wagging, that is, “figure eight”. The first of them is used when the distance to the honey plant does not exceed 12 m, 35 or 65 m. The numbers are indicated for different breeds.
Bee dance
Angle between line segment and plumb axis equal to angle between the direction towards the Sun and towards the honey plant. And the time it takes to travel a segment is the distance. Example: 1 s – 500 m, 2 s – 2 km.
“Wagging” always occurs at a frequency of 15 Hz. What caused this is the question. Known Issues:
- Bees do not collect when the Sun is at its zenith. The problem is solved by deflecting the luminary by 2.5 degrees.
- Different breeds have different dance speeds. The Krajina breed is fast, the Caucasian breeds are not. Some bees do not understand others.
Every bee has both a stopwatch and a clock built into its brain.
Night dancing experience:
- A lamp is shined onto the glass walls of the hive;
- If the experiment is carried out before 24:00, the dance of scout bees indicates an “evening” honey plant;
- If after 24:00, then in the “morning” (Lindauer’s experience).
The language of communication of bees is not conversational. But you can argue: the dance of the two scouts lasts 5-6 hours. One bee sees the others, and she strives not to give in.
Bees are highly organized insects. There are legends about their coherence in actions, “public” and family life. It is interesting that a bee, in principle, can lead a solitary lifestyle. But he still prefers to coexist in a society of his own kind. One of the questions that scientists continue to debate is: “How do bees find their way home?” There are several explanations for this phenomenon. Let's try to figure it out.
Bee family. Uterus
Bees in their own way social status heterogeneous. There is a queen bee, which is fed in a special way and looks larger than an ordinary bee. She lays eggs (sometimes two thousand a day), is responsible for the reproduction of the species, and lives longer than all the others. The queen leaves the hive only a few times in her life in order to be fertilized. She spends the rest of the time (usually five or six years) inside, where she is served by other individuals.
Drones
They play the role of a kind of “sperm bank” and are intended mainly only for the continuation of the bee family and the reproduction of offspring. A sexually mature male drone flies out of the hive several times, copulates with the queen in flight, after which he soon dies. The remaining drones live only a few months and, with the onset of cold weather, are expelled from the hive by other bees. Outside the house they die from cold and hunger.
Worker bees
These are sterile females, whose purpose is to collect pollen and nectar, serve the larvae and the queen. These insects will be discussed.
Which bees find their way home?
Working individuals are precisely those bees that, in search of food, fly away from the hive over fairly large distances (relative to their size). How do bees find their way home? After all, a bee that collected nectar several kilometers from home returns to its place to “hand over” it to feed the family, and flies back again! This happens every day several times.
Biocommunication system
Bees use it to exchange various signals. One of these is the peculiar smell of your bee colony. It helps the bee, which has a fairly developed sense of smell (for example, drones find an unfertilized queen by smell), to return home. American scientists conducted scientific experiments that showed how bees find their way to a treat: these insects smell over long distances. And by using certain scents, they can even be trained to some extent! Thus, bees were taught to search for dangerous substances by smell: nitroglycerin or dynamite, for example.
Sun position
It is quite difficult for people in cloudy weather to determine where the sun may be. In bees this happens much easier. They constantly use the position of the sun as a kind of reference point. Moreover, for bees the presence of clouds does not matter at all. The main thing is the polarization of light in the sky and certain vibrations that occur from it. So, to the question “How do bees find their way home?” You can answer like this: “According to the sun.” This phenomenon is similar to the action of a compass, as if built into the head of an insect. Thus, the worker bee does not spend much time searching for the way back to the hive, but uses it as a guide. I wonder what this insect“keeps in memory” the route flown for several days!
Landscape orientation
And also, according to the testimony of some biologists, one of the versions of how bees find their way home is their ability to navigate the terrain, use and remember changes in the landscape. Using experiments, scientists have established that a bee can find a road at a distance of more than 10 kilometers, in any weather, even cloudy. And for several days, keep the location of the home hive in memory.
Bees are highly organized insects. There are legends about their coherence in actions, “social life” and family life. It is interesting that a bee, in principle, can lead a solitary lifestyle. But he still prefers to coexist in a society of his own kind. One of the questions that scientists continue to debate is: “How do bees find their way home?” There are several explanations for this phenomenon. Let's try to figure it out.
Bee family. Uterus
Bees are heterogeneous in their social status. There is a queen bee, which is fed in a special way and looks larger than an ordinary bee. She lays eggs (sometimes two thousand a day), is responsible for the reproduction of the species, and lives longer than all the others. The queen leaves the hive only a few times in her life in order to be fertilized. She spends the rest of the time (usually five or six years) inside, where she is served by other individuals.
Drones
They play the role of a kind of “sperm bank” and are intended mainly only for the continuation of the bee family and the reproduction of offspring. A sexually mature male drone flies out of the hive several times, copulates with the queen in flight, after which he soon dies. The remaining drones live only a few months and, with the onset of cold weather, are expelled from the hive by other bees. Outside the house they die from cold and hunger. 
Worker bees
These are sterile females, whose purpose is to collect pollen and nectar, serve the larvae and the queen. These insects will be discussed.
Which bees find their way home?
Working individuals are precisely those bees that, in search of food, fly away from the hive over fairly large distances (relative to their size). How do bees find their way home? After all, a bee that collected nectar several kilometers from home returns to its place to “hand over” it to feed the family, and flies back again! This happens every day several times.
Biocommunication system
Bees use it for transfer of information, exchanging various signals. One of these is the peculiar smell of your bee colony. It helps the bee, which has a fairly developed sense of smell (for example, drones find an unfertilized queen by smell), to return home. American scientists conducted scientific experiments that showed how bees find their way to a treat: these insects smell over long distances. And by using certain scents, they can even be trained to some extent! Thus, bees were taught to search for dangerous substances by smell: nitroglycerin or dynamite, for example.
Sun position
It is quite difficult for people in cloudy weather to determine where the sun may be. In bees this happens much easier. They constantly use the position of the sun as a kind of reference point. Moreover, for bees the presence of clouds does not matter at all. The main thing is the polarization of light in the sky and certain vibrations that occur from it. So, to the question “How do bees find their way home?” You can answer like this: “According to the sun.” This phenomenon is similar to the action of a compass, as if built into the head of an insect. Thus, the worker bee does not spend much time searching for the way back to the hive, but uses it as a guide. Interestingly, this insect “keeps in memory” the path it flies for several days! 
Landscape orientation
And also, according to the testimony of some biologists, one of the versions of how bees find their way home is their ability to navigate the terrain, use and remember changes in the landscape. Using experiments, scientists have established that a bee can find a road at a distance of more than 10 kilometers, in any weather, even cloudy. And for several days, keep the location of the home hive in memory.
To the question How do bees find their hive? after all, they fly several kilometers away from him, and there are a lot of hives given by the author Adaptation the best answer is You will be surprised, but by the smell and the magnetic field of the earth. A bee senses its hive several kilometers away. If the hive is moved sideways a few meters, she will no longer hit it, because she will look for it exactly at the point where it stood before...
Answer from 22 answers[guru]
Hello! Here is a selection of topics with answers to your question: How do bees find their hive? after all, they fly several kilometers away from it, and there are a lot of hives
Answer from be luxurious[guru]
In books on beekeeping you can read a lot of interesting things about the life of these small living creatures. Bees remember where they should return. Each bee has its own little compass and map in its head. And they convey information about honey-bearing places to each other by dancing on the arrival board.
Answer from Alex Andrusevich[guru]
Honeybees find their way to their home hive, guided not only by the position of the Sun and the polarization of light in the sky, but also by the features of the landscape; in addition, these insects remember the path along which they need to fly to the hive for several days.
A group of scientists from the Australian national university studied the behavior of bees, releasing them at different distances from the hive. It is believed that bees remember the distance and direction they fly and return exactly the same way. The researchers caught bees returning to their hives and put them in a box, after which they took them several kilometers and watched how the insects would get there. The fact that the bees traveled in a box left them without information about the direction and distance to the hive, meaning that in this case they had to be guided by their knowledge of the landscape. The insects were transported to four places, according to the cardinal directions.
In an article published in the online journal PLoS ONE, entomologists report that bees released four kilometers from the hive easily found their way, but insects taken to east direction, got home faster.
The bees that were released in the east saw Black Mountain in front of them on their way back, which could serve as a good landmark for them. Likewise, they reached the hive faster if they were released in the afternoon, when the sun moved west. When the distance was increased to 7 km, only those insects that were released from the eastern side reached the house. Bees that found themselves 13 km away took 2–3 days to find their way.
Bees can return home without even having an exact “map” of the route; to choose a direction, they need the most general landscape landmarks and the sky with the Sun above their heads. According to the scientists, what they were most surprised by was that the insects were able to retain information about the location of the house in memory for several days, which took them a long way to the hive.