Social complexity and learning foraging tasks in bees

Social complexity and models concerning central place foraging were tested with respect to learning predictions using the social honey bee (Apis mellifera ) and solitary blue orchard bee (Osmia lignaria) when given foraging problems. Both species were presented the same foraging problems, where 1) o...

Full description

Autores:
Amaya Márquez, Marisol
Wells, Harrington
Tipo de recurso:
Article of journal
Fecha de publicación:
2008
Institución:
Universidad Nacional de Colombia
Repositorio:
Universidad Nacional de Colombia
Idioma:
spa
OAI Identifier:
oai:repositorio.unal.edu.co:unal/72908
Acceso en línea:
https://repositorio.unal.edu.co/handle/unal/72908
http://bdigital.unal.edu.co/37383/
Palabra clave:
59 Animales / Animals
Rights
openAccess
License
Atribución-NoComercial 4.0 Internacional
Description
Summary:Social complexity and models concerning central place foraging were tested with respect to learning predictions using the social honey bee (Apis mellifera ) and solitary blue orchard bee (Osmia lignaria) when given foraging problems. Both species were presented the same foraging problems, where 1) only reward molarity varied between flower morphs, and 2) only reward volume varied between flower morphs. Experiments utilized blue vs. white flower patches to standardize rewards in each experimental situation. Although honey bees learned faster than blue orchard bees when given a molarity difference reward problem, there was no significant difference in learning rate when presented a volume difference reward problem. Further, the rate at which blue orchard bees learned the volume difference problem was not significantly different from that with which honey bees learned about reward molarity differences. The results do not support the predictions of the social complexity theory, but do support those of the central place model