Social waves in giant honeybees (Apis dorsata) elicit nest vibrations

Kastberger, Gerald; Weihmann, Frank; Hoetzl, Thomas

doi:10.1007/s00114-013-1056-z

Cited by 18 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…In giant honeybees, the directivity of bucket bridging was described previously [8]. In the present work, we show that the majority of shimmering-active bees (63.18%) do not contribute to the wave propagation in the main direction (Fig.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 83%

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Speeding Up Social Waves. Propagation Mechanisms of Shimmering in Giant Honeybees

et al. 2014

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Shimmering is a defence behaviour in giant honeybees (Apis dorsata), whereby bees on the nest surface flip their abdomen upwards in a Mexican wave-like process. However, information spreads faster than can be ascribed to bucket bridging, which is the transfer of information from one individual to an adjacent one. We identified a saltatoric process that speeds up shimmering by the generation of daughter waves, which subsequently merge with the parental wave, producing a new wave front. Motion patterns of individual “focus” bees (n = 10,894) and their shimmering-active neighbours (n = 459,558) were measured with high-resolution video recording and stereoscopic imaging. Three types of shimmering-active surface bees were distinguished by their communication status, termed “agents”: “Bucket-bridging” agents comprised 74.98% of all agents, affected 88.17% of their neighbours, and transferred information at a velocity of v = 0.317±0.015 m/s. “Chain-tail” agents comprised 9.20% of the agents, were activated by 6.35% of their neighbours, but did not motivate others to participate in the wave. “Generator agents” comprised 15.82% of agents, showed abdominal flipping before the arrival of the main wave front, and initiated daughter waves. They affected 6.75% of their neighbourhood and speeded up the compound shimmering process compared to bucket bridging alone by 41.5% to v = 0.514±0.019 m/s. The main direction of shimmering was reinforced by 35.82% of agents, whereas the contribution of the complementing agents was fuzzy. We discuss that the saltatoric process could enable the bees to instantly recruit larger cohorts to participate in shimmering and to respond rapidly to changes in flight direction of preying wasps. A third, non-exclusive explanation is that at a distance of up to three metres from the nest the acceleration of shimmering could notably contribute to the startle response in mammals and birds.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 83%

“…Most of the colony members, including those in subsurface layers or at the opposite comb side, continually receive information about the shimmering status mechanoceptically [7]–[8], [12]. Surface bees also release Nasonov pheromone [38], motivating others to participate in the wave.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Speeding Up Social Waves. Propagation Mechanisms of Shimmering in Giant Honeybees

et al. 2014

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“…[550,556] Another vibration-mediated behavior known as "shimmering" arises in the giant honeybee, Apis dorsata, upon the emergence of a threat such as a predator. Shimmering behavior is a social motion, similar to "the wave" in football stadiums, [557] in which the bees on the surface of a nest all periodically (<1 Hz) raise their abdomens in a manner that propagates across the surface, often emanating from a central locus. This behavior has an aposematic function, but it also causes the entire comb to vibrate as an underdamped oscillator, alerting all the bees in the colony to the presence of a threat nearly instantaneously.…”

Section: Communication In Large-scale Nestsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This behavior has an aposematic function, but it also causes the entire comb to vibrate as an underdamped oscillator, alerting all the bees in the colony to the presence of a threat nearly instantaneously. [557] …”

Section: Communication In Large-scale Nestsmentioning

confidence: 99%

It's Not a Bug, It's a Feature: Functional Materials in Insects

2018

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Over the course of their wildly successful proliferation across the earth, the insects as a taxon have evolved enviable adaptations to their diverse habitats, which include adhesives, locomotor systems, hydrophobic surfaces, and sensors and actuators that transduce mechanical, acoustic, optical, thermal, and chemical signals. Insect‐inspired designs currently appear in a range of contexts, including antireflective coatings, optical displays, and computing algorithms. However, as over one million distinct and highly specialized species of insects have colonized nearly all habitable regions on the planet, they still provide a largely untapped pool of unique problem‐solving strategies. With the intent of providing materials scientists and engineers with a muse for the next generation of bioinspired materials, here, a selection of some of the most spectacular adaptations that insects have evolved is assembled and organized by function. The insects presented display dazzling optical properties as a result of natural photonic crystals, precise hierarchical patterns that span length scales from nanometers to millimeters, and formidable defense mechanisms that deploy an arsenal of chemical weaponry. Successful mimicry of these adaptations may facilitate technological solutions to as wide a range of problems as they solve in the insects that originated them.

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“…Giant honeybees have evolved shimmering behaviour for collective defence (Seeley et al 1982 ; Kastberger et al 2011a ; Weihmann et al 2012 ). Visual threats provoke patterns reminiscent of Mexican waves, which propagate with a characteristic velocity and in a controlled direction over the surface of a giant honeybee nest (Kastberger et al 2012 , 2013a , b ). The first 200–300 ms of a shimmering wave form a flash-like visual signal with the capacity to repel a preying wasp (Kastberger et al 2008 , 2010 ; cf.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Giant honeybees (Apis dorsata) mob wasps away from the nest by directed visual patterns

Kastberger

Weihmann

Zierler

et al. 2014

Naturwissenschaften

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The open nesting behaviour of giant honeybees (Apis dorsata) accounts for the evolution of a series of defence strategies to protect the colonies from predation. In particular, the concerted action of shimmering behaviour is known to effectively confuse and repel predators. In shimmering, bees on the nest surface flip their abdomens in a highly coordinated manner to generate Mexican wave-like patterns. The paper documents a further-going capacity of this kind of collective defence: the visual patterns of shimmering waves align regarding their directional characteristics with the projected flight manoeuvres of the wasps when preying in front of the bees’ nest. The honeybees take here advantage of a threefold asymmetry intrinsic to the prey–predator interaction: (a) the visual patterns of shimmering turn faster than the wasps on their flight path, (b) they “follow” the wasps more persistently (up to 100 ms) than the wasps “follow” the shimmering patterns (up to 40 ms) and (c) the shimmering patterns align with the wasps’ flight in all directions at the same strength, whereas the wasps have some preference for horizontal correspondence. The findings give evidence that shimmering honeybees utilize directional alignment to enforce their repelling power against preying wasps. This phenomenon can be identified as predator driving which is generally associated with mobbing behaviour (particularly known in selfish herds of vertebrate species), which is, until now, not reported in insects.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00114-014-1220-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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Social waves in giant honeybees (Apis dorsata) elicit nest vibrations

Cited by 18 publications

References 32 publications

Speeding Up Social Waves. Propagation Mechanisms of Shimmering in Giant Honeybees

Speeding Up Social Waves. Propagation Mechanisms of Shimmering in Giant Honeybees

It's Not a Bug, It's a Feature: Functional Materials in Insects

Giant honeybees (Apis dorsata) mob wasps away from the nest by directed visual patterns

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