Waggle dance

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A term used in beekeeping for a particular figure-eight dance of the honeybee. While the round dance is performed for food sources close to the colony (less than 50-80 m), the waggle dance is used for more distant floral sites.

Two components of the waggle dance are known to convey information to other bees

1. a straight run — the direction of which conveys information about the direction of the food
2. the speed at which the dance is repeated which indicates how far away the food is

Upon return to the beehive, a forager bee is able to convey the direction of the food source according to the angle of the waggle run on the vertical surface. For instance, if the bee waggles directly up the surface, then the food source is directly toward the sun. If the bee waggles directly down the surface, then the food source is directly away from the sun. If the food source was located 90 degrees to the right of the sun, the bee would waggle 90 degrees to the right. The polarized vision of bees allows them to make out the location of the sun in patches of blue sky even if the sun itself is hidden behind the clouds.

Amazingly, waggle dancing bees that have been in the hive for a period, time adjust the angle of the dance to the angle of the progressing sun. Therefore bees that follow the straight run of the waggle dance are still correctly led to the food source even though its relative angle to the sun has changed.

References

• Gould, J. L. (1975) Honey bee recruitment: the dance-language controversy. Science 189, 685−693.
• Riley, J.R., Greggers, U., Smith, A.D., Reynolds, D.R. & Menzel,R. (2005). The flight paths of honeybees recruited by the waggle dance. Nature 435,205-207.
• von Frisch, K. (1967) The Dance Language and Orientation of Bees. Cambridge,MA: Harvard Univ. Press.

See also

• Animal communication
• Bee learning and communication
• Honeybee

Sources

• [Communication and Recruitment to Food Sources by Apis mellifera] USDA-ARS, accessed March 2005
• [Honeybee Communication] Kimball's Biology Pages, accessed September 2005

 

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