Author(s)

Mark K. Greco, Johann Lang, Peter Gallmann, Nicholas Priest, Edward Feil, Karl Crailsheim

Department für Klinische Veterin?rmedizin, Vetsuisse-Fakult?t, Universit?t Bern, Bern, Switzerland.
Department of Biology and Biochemistry, University of Bath, Bath, UK;.
Department of Biology and Biochemistry, University of Bath, Bath, UK;INVERT Group, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, University of Bath, Bath, UK.
Institute for Zoology at the Karl-Franzens-Universit?t Graz, Austria.
Swiss Bee Research Institute, Agroscope Liebefeld-Posieux Research Station (ALP), Bern, Switzerland.

Decision making in honeybees is based on information which is acquired and processed in order to make choices between two or more alternatives. These choices lead to the expression of optimal behaviour strategies such as floral constancy. Optimal foraging strategies such as floral constancy improve a colony’s chances of survival, however to our knowledge, there has been no research on decision making based on optimal storage strategies. Here we show, using diagnostic radioentomology, that decision making in storer bees is influenced by nectar sugar concentrations and that, within 48 hours of collection, honeybees workers store carbohydrates in groups of cells with similar sugar concentrations in a nonrandom way. This behaviour, as evidenced by patchy spatial cell distributions, would help to hasten the ripening process by reducing the distance between cells of similar sugar concentrations. Thus, colonies which exhibit optimal storage strategies such as these would have an evolutionary advantage and im- prove colony survival expectations over less efficient colonies and it should be plausible to select colonies that exhibit these preferred traits.

Honey; Floral Constancy; Nectar; Foraging Behaviour; Decision Making

Greco, M. , Lang, J. , Gallmann, P. , Priest, N. , Feil, E. and Crailsheim, K. (2013) Sugar concentration influences decision making in Apis mellifera L. workers during early-stage honey storage behaviour. Open Journal of Animal Sciences, 3, 210-218. doi: 10.4236/ojas.2013.33031.