The transmission of food between Worker Honeybees

Abstract

Summaryo

1. 1.

   A study has been made of the behaviour patterns associated with food transmission between worker honeybees.

2. 2.

   There is a general tendency for food to pass from the older to the younger workers of a colony, although there is a considerable passage of food in the opposite direction. Younger bees generally receive food more frequently than they give it.

3. 3.

   As worker bees grow older, the mean ages of the bees that feed them and to whom they give food also increase.

4. 4.

   Although bees about to give food generally have more in their honeystomachs than those about to receive it the quantities of food contained in the honeystomachs of bees in these two groups overlap considerably. The transmission of ‘queen substance’, the occupation on which a bee is engaged within the hive, and her environment, all influence the result.

5. 5.

   The correlation between a bee's behaviour in connection with food transmission and the amount of food in her honeystomach is more marked in the case of recently emerged, unconditioned bees, than in the case of bees taken at random from their colonies.

6. 6.

   The amount of food that individual bees retain in their honeystomachs is influenced by their past experience.