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Multi-source odor-marking of food by a stingless bee, Melipona mandacaia

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Abstract

Social bees can deposit specialized glandular secretions, or signals, that allow foragers to revisit rewarding and to avoid unrewarding food sources. However, it is not known if bees can orient towards olfactory cues such as excreta deposited near food sources. We report that Melipona mandacaia foragers (stingless bees) deposit an odor cue, anal droplets, and a previously undescribed ventro-abdominal odor on food sources. Surprisingly, foragers deposited attractive odor marks on good food sources to which they recruited and on poor food sources to which they did not recruit. Foragers left the most anal droplets on dilute food sources to which they did not recruit (1.25-M sucrose solution), yet returning foragers were attracted to anal droplets obtained on poor food sources and presented in bioassays. Foragers were attracted to ventro-abdominal odors obtained on good food sources (2.5-M sucrose solution). Chemical extractions suggest that odor marks contain attractive polar compounds. We also provide the first detailed description of forager waggling and spinning behavior on poor and good food sources. Waggling may be a method of dispersing anal droplets and spinning may help foragers learn local landmarks.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Zilá Luz Paulino Simões for generously providing supplies for our odor extraction experiments; Felipe A. L. Contrera and Vera L. Imperatriz-Fonseca for valuable assistance with the setup of the experiments; and Patrick Kelley for help with videotaping feeder behaviors. We would also like to thank caretakers Maridalva Arauso Dias and her husband Paulo Rovirsso Sousa Dias for their hospitality and hard work at the Fazenda Aretuzina. Melissa Thomas and four anonymous reviewers significantly enhanced the quality of this manuscript with their comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of California San Diego, Mail Code 0116, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA

    James C. Nieh

  2. Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, 26 Oxford St., Cambridge, MA 02138, USA

    Santiago Ramírez

  3. Bee Laboratory, Instituto Biociencias, University of São Paulo, 05508–900, São Paulo , Brazil

    Paulo Nogueira-Neto

Authors
  1. James C. Nieh
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  2. Santiago Ramírez
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  3. Paulo Nogueira-Neto
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Correspondence to James C. Nieh.

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Communicated by R.F.A. Moritz

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Nieh, J.C., Ramírez, S. & Nogueira-Neto, P. Multi-source odor-marking of food by a stingless bee, Melipona mandacaia . Behav Ecol Sociobiol 54, 578–586 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-003-0658-4

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