European Honey Bee (Apis mellifera) Waggle Dance

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• published: 04 Feb 2013
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Exhibited here are multiple female Honey Bees of the species Apis mellifera performing the Waggle Dance. This dance is a communication device used by foraging females to display the location of good food sources to other foragers within the nest. It follows a figure-eight pattern, with the waggle being in the center. For cavity-nesting honey bees, such as those displayed here, the honey combs are vertically oriented. The angle of the waggle phase represents the angle of the food source with respect to the sun, assuming the sun represents the vertical. The length of the waggle run is correlated with the distance of the food source from the nest; the greater the length, the farther the food is from the nest. The speed of each waggle is associated with the excitement of the bee in regards to the quality of the food source. If she is more excited, she will wiggle her abdomen more rapidly. The waggle dance is only used when food is "far" away, generally at a distance of 100 meters or more. When the food source is closer, the forager uses the round dance, which is essentially a simplified dance that doesn't communicate distance and direction. In short, as distance increases, the total number of waggle runs per unit time goes down (because they are longer), while the duration, distance covered, and sound duration are all increased. Other foragers are able to find a waggle dancer inside a crowded, noisy nest via a variety of methods: 1) Bees returning from good food sources have warmer bodies. 2) Bees maintain antennae contact during the waggle dance with any bee in the vicinity 3) Bees dancing have specific odors adhering to their body: waggle-dancing bees produce and release two alkanes, tricosane and pentacosane, and two alkenes, (Z)-9-tricosene and (Z)-9-pentacosene, onto their abdomens and into the air. 4) Dancing bees exhibit trophollaxis, the transfer of food via mouth-to-mouth contact. 5) Vibrations are given off by waggle dancers. Accuracy of the waggle dance varies with the distance of the food source. As the distance of the food from the nest increases, the accuracy of the dance (angle and distance) also increases. This is called the Tuned-error hypothesis. It suggests that there is an intentional poor accuracy as closer distances; this is beneficial because it spreads other bees out over an area, and can yield increased resources. At close distances, returning to the nest is easy, and being 5% off from the intended source isn't significant. As distance increases, however, accuracy is much higher because returning to the nest is more difficult, and a discrepancy of 5% can result in offsets of kilometers rather than meters if the distance is great enough. Only females forage. Those that forage are also in the later stages of their life, generally from Day 22 of reaching adulthood until their death, which can be as long as 34 days or longer. Because bee, like all Hymenoptera, are holometabolous, they spend a large portion of their lives first as developing larvae (generally between 6 and 7 days), followed by a pupation (for 10-12 days), followed by their emergence as adult bees. Developing larvae hatch from eggs after three days, signifying that the entire life cycle, from egg until death, can reach 55 days or more. All eggs are laid by the queen. Males are only useful for sperm; they are otherwise parasitic, siphoning off colony resources while providing nothing beneficial.