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A comparison of the dance language in Apis mellifera carnica and Apis florea reveals striking similarities

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Abstract

Honeybees have a dance language by which successful foragers inform nestmates about attractive food patches. The classical concept of dialects in the dance language of honeybees points to two differences in the dances by different species and races, firstly in the flight distance at which the dancers start performing waggle dances instead of round dances, and secondly in the circuit duration of the waggle dance performed for a given flight distance. However, recent findings have indicated that the dance language is influenced and affected by a number of parameters, both genetic and environmental. The current study was carried out to see whether the distance at which dancers change from round dances to waggle dances is statistically different in two different species, Apis mellifera carnica and A. florea and to develop a set of definitions for such comparative studies. Results show that the two species do not differ in the relative proportion of waggle dances and round dances performed at a given distance. Thus, this study points to the need of addressing the dialect question again.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank H. Pechhacker, who made our study at Lunz Am See possible, Melanie Raab and K.A. Ponnana for their help in carrying out the experiments in Würzburg and Bangalore, Raghavendra Gadagkar for suggestions and comments and the Centre for Ecological Sciences and the DFG (SFB 554 and GK 200) for funding. The experiments comply with the Principles of animal care, publication no. 86-23, revised 1985 of the National Institutes of Health and with the current laws of the respective countries in which the experiments were performed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, 560012, Bangalore, India

    M. Sen Sarma

  2. Department of Biology, College of Science, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556, USA

    H. Esch

  3. Beegroup Würzburg, Biozentrum, Universität Am Hubland, 97074, Würzburg, Germany

    J. Tautz

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  1. M. Sen Sarma
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  2. H. Esch
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  3. J. Tautz
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Correspondence to J. Tautz.

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Sen Sarma, M., Esch, H. & Tautz, J. A comparison of the dance language in Apis mellifera carnica and Apis florea reveals striking similarities. J Comp Physiol A 190, 49–53 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00359-003-0470-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00359-003-0470-7

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