Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
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Water
Pollen
Nectar
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Empty
Figure 5.9.
Average responsiveness of foraging honey bees returning with water,
pollen, both water and pollen, or empty. Bees were tested when they were less
than one week old and were then collected when they returned from foraging
trips. Reprinted with kind permission from Springer Science+Business Media:
Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology,
Response thresholds to sucrose predict
foraging division of labor in honeybees, 47(4), 2000, 265-267, Pankiw T, Page
RE, Fig. 1.
h is is a robust i nding, but it does not leave us with a single hypoth-
esis. H4 and H6 can both explain the results that genotype af ects su-
crose response and sucrose response correlates with foraging behavior.
(H3 and H5 fail because we know that foraging experience does af ect
response to sugar [RS].) Further resolution will require modulating RS
directly and independently and then observing changes in foraging
behavior, something we do not yet know how to do.
5.4.2 Sensitivity to Pollen
Sensitivity to pollen correlates with sensitivity to sugar. Pollen
touched to the antenna can elicit a proboscis extension response in
bees that are also sensitive to sucrose. Christoph Grüter and Walter
Farina showed that wild-type pollen foragers were more sensitive to
