Project Details
Navigation and dance communication in hoenybees
Applicant
Professor Dr. Randolf Menzel
Subject Area
Sensory and Behavioural Biology
Cognitive, Systems and Behavioural Neurobiology
Cognitive, Systems and Behavioural Neurobiology
Term
from 2014 to 2022
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 259453822
The symbolic character of information transfer in the waggle dance of honeybees is well founded since the discoveries by Karl von Frisch. However, little is known how recruits decode this information and how they use it in the outbound flights. We shall address this question by video recording the dance communication process and by recording the electric fields emanating from the dancing bee. Then the outbound flight of the recruited bee will be tracked with harmonic radar. This will allow us to quantify the decoding process on the side of the recruits. We shall quantify the information transfer in the waggle dance with a novel device that measures the distance and direction code with the electric fields emanating from the dancing bee. These measurements will allow us to localize more precisely the places of natural food sources and potential nest sites. Since recruits are experienced bees we shall ask whether they may refer the information collected from the dancer to the memory of the landscape structure, and thus may develop expectations of the flight route towards the indicated goal.
DFG Programme
Research Grants