Abstract
Sensory abilities and cognitive processes for honey bees, bumble bees, and stingless bees have been demonstrated through conditioning experiments using odor as a conditioned stimulus (CS) and sugar solution as an unconditioned stimulus (US). Social bee conditioning employs the proboscis extension reflex (PER) to elicit an innate response to sucrose solution. However, solitary bees fail to reliably exhibit PER in response to touching antennae or tarsi with sugar solution. Here we employ a newly established, conditioning protocol for unrestrained solitary bees, i.e., the commercially available Osmia lignaria and Megachile rotundata, that allows them to explore a rearing chamber in which training can occur to subsequently reveal the ability to discriminate between an odor associated with sugar-water and a different odor associated with no reward, using three different odor pairings. No innate preference for any trial odor was found for either species. Osmia lignaria females and males clearly showed the ability to discriminate between odors after conditioning; M. rotundata adults demonstrated discrimination learning in only one set of odor pairings. Laboratory assays to condition solitary bees to not only associate odor with reward but to also discriminate between odors could support studies that address bee behavior and motivation, bee floral specialization or flower constancy, and sublethal effects of environmental stressors on bee performance. The discrepancy we found in species responses highlights the need for comparative studies, because there is no one-size-fits-all protocol for examining cognitive and learning abilities of the many species of bees whose life histories and experiences influence their behavior.
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Data Availability Statement
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
We thank USDA ARS technician Ellen Klomps and ARS summer employees Michael Barker, Nicole Boehme, Sarah Clark, Elizabeth Sharp, Hannah Turner, and Shannon Wooley for their assistance in bee maintenance, training, and bioassays. Appreciation is extended to Ricardo Ramirez, Kimberly Sullivan, Natalie Boyle, Morgan Dunn and anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on this manuscript. Mention of trade names or commercial products in this publication is solely for the purpose of providing specific information and does not imply recommendation or endorsement by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
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Research was funded by the USDA ARS Pollinating Insects Research Unit.
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Both authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed primarily by Cory Stanley-Stahr as a dissertation chapter. The manuscript was written by both authors.
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Supplementary file7 (JPG 1073 KB) Figure S1. Side and top views of testing arena for solitary bee bioassays (Stanley-Stahr and Pitts-Singer 2023) made from a 1.42 L plastic bowl (height x diameter: 8.5 cm x 16.5 cm) with three mesh windows (a) and a mesh lid (b). A bee enters the arena from a vial attached to the side (c). Once inside, the bee can choose between two feeders (d), which are filter paper disks with small segments of cigarette filter attached from below by thumbtacks. The feeders rest on a rectangular piece of aluminum foil (e).
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Stanley-Stahr, C.A., Pitts-Singer, T.L. Odor Discrimination after Olfactory Conditioning of Managed Solitary Bees, Osmia Lignaria and Megachile Rotundata. J Insect Behav 36, 180–194 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10905-023-09825-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10905-023-09825-8