# Head-Butting Honey bees.



## alleyyooper (Apr 22, 2005)

Stop Signals Provide Cross Inhibition in Collective Decision Making by Honeybee Swarms," by T.D. Seeley at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY; P.K. Visscher at University of California, Riverside in Riverside, CA; T. Schlegel, N.R. Franks at University of Bristol in Bristol, UK; P.M. Hogan, J.A.R. Marshall at University of Sheffield in Sheffield, UK. Science Magazine.



Head-butting isn't usually a good persuasion tactic for humans, but a new study shows that this behavior seems to help honeybees reach a consensus on new hive sites. In the decision-making process of swarming bees, where multiple "scout" bees relay information about suitable locations to other bees, the insects duke it out, head-butting each other until they come to a collective agreement. The process is akin to what happens in complex mammalian brains, where humans and other animals make decisions based on information relayed by multiple neurons. Tom Seeley and colleagues established honeybee swarms on Appledore Island, in Maine. The researchers gave scout bees a choice of two identical nest boxes. Scouts visiting one box were marked with yellow paint, and those visiting the other box were marked with pink paint. During the hive site selection process, scouts advertise potential locations by performing a wiggly dance. The team observed that dancing scouts with yell ow paint received significantly more head-butts from scouts with pink paint and vice versa, demonstrating that the scouts are attempting to stop the dances of bees drawing attention to a competing site. As the head-butts accumulate, travel to other sites ceases and the bees prepare to swarm to the site that was best represented. The observations indicate that head-butting helps honeybee swarms reach a rapid consensus on where to call home, a finding confirmed by computational models.


 Al


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## stormwalker (Oct 27, 2004)

It works for me! But then, I have an outsized brain-pan!
LOL
That is some neat study!


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## tom j (Apr 3, 2009)

now I understand the baseball bat !!!!!!!!


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