Colour Discrimination in the Dronefly, Eristalis tenax

Abstract

DIFFERENTIAL reactions to various wave-lengths or wave-length bands, independent of intensity, have been claimed for several members of the group of Diptera^1–4. None of the authors concerned, however, had based his experiments on the training method which, when applied to honey-bees, had yielded more detailed and exhaustive results than any other method^5,6. It may therefore be of interest that a solitary insect belonging to the group of Diptera has been trained to colours successfully for the first time, in preliminary experiments carried out in this Department.