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1.
Andy M. Reynolds 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》2009,64(1):19-23
Bumblebees forage uninterrupted for long periods of time because they are not distracted by sex or territorial defense and have few predators. This has led to a long running debate about whether bumblebees forage optimally. This debate has been enriched by the possibility that bumblebees foraging within clover patches have flight patterns that can be approximated by Lévy flights. Such flight patterns optimise the success of random searches. Bumblebees foraging within a flower patch tend to approach the nearest flower but then often depart without landing or probing it if it has been visited previously; unvisited flowers are not rejected in this manner. Here, this foraging behaviour has been replicated in numerical simulations. Lévy flight patterns are found to be an inconsequential emergent property of a bumblebees’ foraging behaviour. Lévy flights are predicted to emerge when bees reject at least 99% of previously visited flowers. A foraging bumblebee can certainly empty a clover flower head of nectar in one visit, but lower rates of rejection are observed for many other flowers. These findings suggest that Lévy flight patterns in foraging bumblebees are rare and specific to a few flower species and that if they exist, then they are not part of an innate, evolved optimal searching strategy. 相似文献
2.
In the absence of predators, pollinators can often maximize their foraging success by visiting the most rewarding flowers.
However, if predators use those highly rewarding flowers to locate their prey, pollinators may benefit from changing their
foraging preferences to accept less rewarding flowers. Previous studies have shown that some predators, such as crab spiders,
indeed hunt preferentially on the most pollinator-attractive flowers. In order to determine whether predation risk can alter
pollinator preferences, we conducted laboratory experiments on the foraging behavior of bumble bees (Bombus impatiens) when predation risk was associated with a particular reward level (measured here as sugar concentration). Bees foraged in
arenas containing a choice of a high-reward and a low-reward artificial flower. On a bee’s first foraging trip, it was either
lightly squeezed with forceps, to simulate a crab spider attack, or was allowed to forage safely. The foragers’ subsequent
visits were recorded for between 1 and 4 h without any further simulated attacks. Compared to bees that foraged safely, bees
that experienced a simulated attack on a low-reward artificial flower had reduced foraging activity. However, bees attacked
on a high-reward artificial flower were more likely to visit low-reward artificial flowers on subsequent foraging trips. Forager
body size, which is thought to affect vulnerability to capture by predators, did not have an effect on response to an attack.
Predation risk can thus alter pollinator foraging behavior in ways that influence the number and reward level of flowers that
are visited. 相似文献
3.
David Goulson Jemma L. Cruise Kate R. Sparrow Adele J. Harris Kirsty J. Park Matthew C. Tinsley Andre S. Gilburn 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》2007,61(10):1523-1529
Flowers exhibit great intra-specific variation in the rewards they offer. At any one time, a significant proportion of flowers
often contain little or no reward. Hence, foraging profitably for floral rewards is problematic and any ability to discriminate
between flowers and avoid those that are less rewarding will confer great advantages. In this study, we examine discrimination
by foraging bees among flowers of nasturtium, Tropaeolum majus. Bee visitors included carpenter bees, Xylocopa violacea, which were primary nectar robbers; honeybees, Apis mellifera, which either acted as secondary nectar robbers or gathered pollen legitimately and bumblebees, Bombus hortorum, which were the only bees able to gather nectar legitimately. Many flowers were damaged by phytophagous insects. Nectar volume
was markedly lower in flowers with damaged petals (which were also likely to be older) and in flowers that had nectar-robbing
holes. We test whether bees exhibit selectivity with regards to the individual flowers, which they approach and enter, and
whether this selectivity enhances foraging efficiency. The flowers approached (within 2 cm) by A. mellifera and B. hortorum were non-random when compared to the floral population; both species selectively approached un-blemished flowers. They both
approached more yellow flowers than would be expected by chance, presumably a reflection of innate colour preferences, for
nectar standing crop did not vary according to flower colour. Bees were also more likely to accept (land on) un-blemished
flowers. A. mellifera gathering nectar exhibited selectivity with regards to the presence of robbing holes, being more likely to land on robbed
flowers (they are not able to feed on un-robbed flowers). That they frequently approached un-robbed flowers suggests that
they are not able to detect robbing holes at long-range, so that foraging efficiency may be limited by visual acuity. Nevertheless,
by using a combination of long-range and short-range selectivity, nectar-gathering A. mellifera and B. hortorum greatly increased the average reward from the flowers on which they landed (by 68% and 48%, respectively) compared to the
average standing crop in the flower population. Overall, our results demonstrate that bees use obvious floral cues (colour
and petal blemishes) at long-range, but can switch to using more subtle cues (robbing holes) at close range. They also make
many mistakes and some cues used do not correlate with floral rewards. 相似文献
4.
Michael C. Otterstatter Robert J. Gegear Sheila R. Colla James D. Thomson 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》2005,58(4):383-389
Parasites can affect host behavior in subtle but ecologically important ways. In the laboratory, we conducted experiments to determine whether parasitic infection by the intestinal protozoan Crithidia bombi or the tracheal mite Locustacarus buchneri alters the foraging behavior of the bumble bee Bombus impatiens. Using an array of equally rewarding yellow and blue artificial flowers, we measured the foraging rate (flowers visited per minute, flower handling time, and flight time between flowers) and flower constancy (tendency to sequentially visit flowers of the same type) of bees with varying intensities of infection. Bumble bee workers infected with tracheal mites foraged as rapidly as uninfected workers, but were considerably more constant to a single flower type (yellow or blue). In contrast, workers infected with intestinal protozoa showed similar levels of flower constancy, but visited 12% fewer flowers per minute on average than uninfected bees. By altering the foraging behavior of bees, such parasites may influence interactions between plants and pollinators, as well as the reproductive output of bumble bee colonies. Our study is the first to investigate the effects of parasitic protozoa and tracheal mites on the foraging behavior of bumble bees, and provides the first report of Crithidia bombi in commercial bumble bees in North America. 相似文献
5.
Kazuharu Ohashi Daniel D’Souza James D. Thomson 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》2010,64(5):891-897
Nectar-feeding animals have served as the subjects of many experimental studies and theoretical models of foraging. Their
willingness to visit artificial feeders renders many species amenable to controlled experiments using mechanical “flowers”
that replenish nectar automatically. However, the structural complexity of such feeders and the lack of a device for tracking
the movements of multiple individuals have limited our ability to ask some specific questions related to natural foraging
contexts, especially in competitive situations. To overcome such difficulties, we developed an experimental system for producing
computer records of multiple foragers harvesting from simple artificial flowers with known rates of nectar secretion, using
radio frequency identification (RFID) tags to identify individual animals. By using infrared detectors (light-emitting diodes
and phototransistors) to activate the RFID readers momentarily when needed, our system prevents the RFID chips from heating
up and disturbing the foraging behavior of focal animals. To demonstrate these advantages, we performed a preliminary experiment
with a captive colony of bumble bees, Bombus impatiens. In the experiment, two bees were tagged with RFID chips (2.5 × 2.5 mm, manufactured by Hitachi-Maxell, Ltd., Tokyo, Japan)
and allowed to forage on 16 artificial flowers arranged in a big flight cage. Using the resulting data set, we present details
of how the bees increased their travel speed between flowers, while decreasing the average nectar crop per flower, as they
gained experience. Our system provides a powerful tool to track the movement patterns, reward history, and long-term foraging
performance of individual foragers at large spatial scales. 相似文献
6.
Comparisons of forager distributions from matched honey bee colonies in suburban environments 总被引:4,自引:0,他引:4
Keith D. Waddington Thomas J. Herbert P. Kirk Visscher Monica Raveret Richter 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》1994,35(6):423-429
We conducted experiments designed to examine the distribution of foraging honey bees (Apis mellifera) in suburban environments with rich floras and to compare spatial patterns of foraging sites used by colonies located in the same environment. The patterns we observed in resource visitation suggest a reduced role of the recruitment system as part of the overall colony foraging strategy in habitats with abundant, small patches of flowers. We simultaneously sampled recruitment dances of bees inside observation hives in two colonies over 4 days in Miami, Florida (1989) and from two other colonies over five days in Riverside, California (1991). Information encoded in the dance was used to determine the distance and direction that bees flew from the hive for pollen and nectar and to construct foraging maps for each colony. The foraging maps showed that bees from the two colonies in each location usually foraged at different sites, but occasionally they visited the same patches of flowers. Each colony shifted foraging effort among sites on different days. In both locations, the mean flight distances differed between colonies and among days within colonies. The flight distances observed in our study are generally shorter than those reported in a similar study conducted in a temperate deciduous forest where resources were less dense and floral patches were smaller. 相似文献
7.
A. Gumbert 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》2000,48(1):36-43
It is usually assumed that the choice behavior of bees for floral colors is influenced by innate preferences only for the
first flower visits prior to any experience. After visits to rewarding flowers bees learn to associate their colors with a
reward. This learning process leads to an acquired preference for the trained colors that has been believed to dominate over
previous experiences and over innate preferences. This work investigates how bumble bees (Bombus terrestris) chose among artificial flowers of different colors after they had been extensively trained to other colors. The bees chose
novel colors according to their similarity to the trained color if the trained color was similar to some of the test colors.
This was true also if trained colors and test colors were well distinguished, so their color choice reflected generalization
between colors. If the test colors were so different from the trained color that no generalization took place, choice behavior
was not affected by the trained color and reflected innate preferences. The differences in choice frequencies could not be
explained by physical properties of the test colors other than the dominant wavelength, a parameter taken to reflect hue perception.
Preferred dominant wavelengths correspond to those observed in naive bumble bees and honeybees. Thus bumble bees show innate
preferences for certain colors not only prior to color learning but also after intensive learning when choosing among very
different novel colors. Color choice among similar colors, however, is controlled by generalization from the learned color.
Received: 9 November 1999 / Received in revised form: 19 March 2000 / Accepted: 31 March 2000 相似文献
8.
Carpenter bees (Xylocopa spp.) act as primary nectar thieves in rabbiteye blueberry (Vaccinium ashei Reade), piercing corollas laterally to imbibe nectar at basal nectaries. Honey bees (Apis mellifera L) learn to visit these perforations and thus become secondary nectar thieves. We tested the hypothesis that honey bees make this behavioral switch in response to an energetic advantage realized by nectar-robbing flower visits. Nectar volume and sugar quantity were higher in intact than perforated flowers, but bees (robbers) visiting perforated flowers were able to extract a higher percentage of available nectar and sugar so that absolute amount of sugar (mg) removed by one bee visit is the same for each flower type. However, because perforated flowers facilitate higher rates of bee flower visitation and the same or higher rates of nectar ingestion, they are rendered more profitable than intact flowers in temporal terms. Accordingly, net energy (J) gain per second flower handling time was higher for robbers on most days sampled. We conclude that the majority evidence indicates an energetic advantage for honey bees that engage in secondary nectar thievery in V. ashei.Communicated by R. Page 相似文献
9.
Summary To study risk aversion in hand-reared bananaquits (Coereba flaveola) we placed individuals in a cage with a 1 m2 floral board having a random array of 85 yellow and 85 red artificial flowers. Flowers of one color were filled with the same quantity of nectar (constant flowers), whereas flowers of the other color were filled with variable quantities of nectar (variable flowers). The constant and variable flowers had identical mean contents, only their variances differed. After three presentations, the constant flowers were made variable and vice versa to control for color preferences. Naive foragers tended to avoid variable flowers. The degree of risk aversion was influenced by previous experience, the relative variability of the variable flowers, and flower color. Variable flowers having similar coefficients of variation, but different reward variables (volume or concentration) resulted in similar levels of risk aversion. Within single foraging episodes the following was observed: sequences of constant flowers increased while sequences of variable flowers remained similar to random foraging; the probability of revisiting a constant flower was higher than revisiting a variable flower; the average amount of nectar consumed from constant and variable flowers was similar within the assessment periods (prior to favoring constant flowers); the proportion of visits falling below the mean expected reward during the assessment period or its inverse (the proportion visited with at least the equivalent of the mean) may be a cue used for risk aversion; risk aversion persisted through long foraging bouts despite changed nectar distributions suggesting that the bananaquits did not track resource distributions well within foraging bouts. 相似文献
10.
Predators hunting for cryptic prey use search images, but how do prey search for cryptic predators? We address this question using the interaction between bumblebees and the colour-changing crab spider Misumena vatia which can camouflage itself on some flowers. In laboratory experiments, we exposed bumblebees to an array of flowers concealing robotic predators (a trapping mechanism combined with a 3D life-sized model of a crab spider or a circle). Groups of bees were trained to avoid either cryptic yellow spiders or yellow circles (equal area to the spiders) or remained predator naive. The bees were then exposed to a new patch of white flowers containing some cryptic predators (either white spiders, white circles or a mixture of both). We monitored individual foraging choices and used a 3D video tracking system to quantify the bees’ flight behaviour. The bees trained to avoid cryptic spiders, chose 40% fewer spider-harbouring flowers than expected by chance, but were indifferent to cryptic circles. They also aborted a higher proportion of landings on flowers harbouring spiders, ultimately feeding from half as many ‘dangerous’ flowers as naive bees. Previous encounters with cryptic spiders also influenced the flight behaviour of bees in the new flower patch. Experienced bees spent more time inspecting the flowers they chose to reject (both with and without concealed spiders) and scanned from side to side more in front of the flowers to facilitate predator detection. We conclude that bees disentangle shape from colour cues and thus can form a generalised search image for spider shapes, independent of colour. 相似文献
11.
Individual bees often restrict their visits to only a few species out of the multitude of available plants. This flower constancy
is likely caused by limitations of memory for motor patterns, sensory stimuli, or reward levels. Here we test the implications
of sensori-motor learning and memory for flower constancy. Artificial “flowers” with two distinct “morphologies” were used,
so that in each flower type, a different motor pattern was needed to reach the nectar. As in natural flowers, these morphological
types were associated with sensory signals (blue and yellow color stimuli). Bees which learned only a single task were more
efficient in several ways than those which had learned two: they made fewer errors, had shorter flower handling times, took
shorter times to correct errors, and transitions between flowers were initially more rapid. For bees which had learned two
tasks, performance depended strongly on the training schedule: if each task was learned with blocked trials, the memory for
the second appeared to interfere with that for the first. Interference affected only the association between flower signal
and motor pattern, not the motor pattern itself. This was not the case if bees were trained for both tasks with alternating
trials. In that case, bees rapidly learned both tasks, albeit with worse saturation levels than bees which had learned only
one. Bees transferred the experience gained on one task to a second task: their initial performance on the second task was
better than their initial performance on the first. On the other hand, performance on the second task in the saturation level (in which bees no longer improve their efficiency) was worse than on the first task (negative transfer). In the saturation
phase, performance did not directly depend on switch frequency, but on whether the bee had one or two options in memory. Thus,
while bees would become proficient at two tasks more quickly if their acquisition phase included switches, such switches had
no measurable effect in the saturation phase. The implications of these findings for foraging are discussed using modern learning
theory.
Received: 4 April 1997 / Accepted after revision: 8 August 1997 相似文献
12.
Bumblebees can avoid recently depleted flowers by responding to repellent scent-marks deposited on flower corollas by previous visitors. It has previously been suggested that avoidance of visited flowers for a fixed period would be a poor strategy, since different plant species vary greatly in the rate at which they replenish floral rewards. In this study, we examined the duration of flower repellency after an initial bumblebee visit, using wild bumblebees (Bombus lapidarius, B. pascuorum and B. terrestris) foraging on four different plant species (Lotus corniculatus, Melilotus officinalis, Phacelia tanacetifolia and Symphytum officinale). We constructed a model to predict flower visitation following an initial visit, based on the nectar secretion pattern of the different plant species, the insect visitation rate per flower, and the search and handling times of bumblebees foraging on the plant species in question. The model predicts an optimal duration of flower avoidance which maximises the rate of reward acquisition for all bees. However, this optimum may be open to cheating. For two plant species, the evolutionary stable strategy (ESS) is a shorter duration of flower avoidance than the optimum. We found the duration of flower avoidance was markedly different among flower species and was inversely related to nectar secretion rates. The predicted ESSs for each plant species were close to those observed, suggesting that the key parameters influencing bumblebee behaviour are those included in the model. We discuss how bees may alter the duration of their response to repellent scents, and other factors that affect flower re-visitation. 相似文献
13.
Andrew M. Reynolds Jennifer L. Swain Alan D. Smith Andrew P. Martin Juliet L. Osborne 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》2009,64(1):115-123
The availability of food resources changes over time and space, and foraging animals are constantly faced with choices about
how to respond when a resource becomes depleted. We hypothesise that flying insects like bees discover new food sources using
an optimal Lévy flight searching strategy and odour-mediated anemotaxis, as well as visual cues. To study these searching
patterns, foraging honeybees were trained to a scented feeder which was then removed. Two new unrewarding feeders, or ‘targets’,
were then positioned up- and downwind of the original location of the training feeder. The subsequent flight patterns of the
bees were recorded over several hundred metres using harmonic radar. We show that the flight patterns constitute an optimal
Lévy flight searching strategy for the location of the training feeder, a strategy that is also optimal for the location of
alternative food sources when patchily distributed. Scented targets that were positioned upwind of the original training feeder
were investigated most with the numbers of investigations declining with increasing distance from the original feeder. Scented
targets in downwind locations were rarely investigated and unscented targets were largely ignored, despite having the same
visual appearance as the rewarding training feeder. 相似文献
14.
Summary In a controlled laboratory experiment, we re-examined the question of bumble bee risk-sensitivity. Harder and Real's (1987) analysis of previous work on bumble bee risk aversion suggests that risk-sensitivity in these organisms is a result of their maximizing the net rate of energy return (calculated as the average of expected per flower rates). Whether bees are risk-sensitive foragers with respect to minimizing the probability of energetic shortfall is therefore still an open question. We examined how the foraging preferences of bumble bees for nectar reward variation were affected by colony energy reserves, which we manipulated by draining or adding sucrose solution to colony honey pots. Nine workers from four confined colonies of Bombus occidentalis foraged for sucrose solution in two patches of artificial flowers. These patches yielded the same expected rate of net energy intake, but floral volumes were variable in one patch and constant in the other. Our results show that bumble bees can be both risk-averse (preferring constant flowers) and risk-prone (preferring variable flowers), depending on the status of their colony energy reserves. Diet choice in bumble bees appears to be sensitive to the target value a colony-level energetic requirement.
Offprint requests to: R.V. Cartar 相似文献
15.
Diane Lefebvre Jacqueline Pierre Yannick Outreman Jean-Sébastien Pierre 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》2007,61(11):1707-1715
The patch living rules of a pollinator, the bumblebee Bombus terrestris L., are studied here in the framework of motivational models widely used for parasitoids: The rewarding events found during
the foraging process are supposed to increase or decrease suddenly the tendency of the insect to stay in the current patch
and therefore to adjust the patch residence time to the patch profitability. The foraging behaviour of these pollinators was
observed in two environment types to determine their patch-leaving decisions. The rich environment was composed of male-fertile
flowers, offering pollen and nectar, and the poor one of male-sterile flowers, offering little nectar and no pollen. The experimental
design consisted of a patch system in which inflorescences were evenly arranged in two rows (1 m distance). Residence times
of foragers inside inflorescences and rows were analysed by a Cox proportional hazards model, taking into account recent and
past experience acquired during the foraging bout. Most of the results showed a decremental motivational mechanism, that is,
a reduction in the residence time on the inflorescence or in the row related to exploitation of flowers within inflorescences
and inflorescences within rows These results indicate that bumblebees tend to leave the patch using departure rules similar
to those found in parasitoids. The results also provide information on the memory, learning and evaluating capabilities of
bumblebees especially when rich and poor environments were compared. The patch-leaving mechanism suggested by this study is
consistent with the central place foraging theory. 相似文献
16.
We studied the extent to which worker honey bees acquire information from waggle dances throughout their careers as foragers. Small groups of foragers were monitored from time of orientation flights to time of death and all in-hive behaviors relating to foraging were recorded. In the context of a novice forager finding her first food source, 60% of the bees relied, at least in part, on acquiring information from waggle dances (being recruited) rather than searching independently (scouting). In the context of an experienced forager whose foraging has been interrupted, 37% of the time the bees resumed foraging by following waggle dances (being reactivated) rather than examining the food source on their own (inspecting). And in the context of an experienced forager engaged in foraging, 17% of the time the bees initiated a foraging trip by following a waggle dance. Such dance following was observed much more often after an unsuccessful than after a successful foraging trip. Successful foragers often followed dances just briefly, perhaps to confirm that the kind of flowers they had been visiting were still yielding forage. Overall, waggle dance following for food discovery accounted for 12–25% of all interactions with dancers (9% by novice foragers and 3–16% by experienced foragers) whereas dance following for reactivation and confirmation accounted for the other 75–88% (26% for reactivation and 49–62% for confirmation). We conclude that foragers make extensive use of the waggle dance not only to start work at new, unfamiliar food sources but also to resume work at old, familiar food sources. 相似文献
17.
In the course of their foraging bouts, bees frequently encounter spider webs among the vegetation. The ability to see and
avoid these webs is vital for the success of the individual bee’s foraging bout. In this study, we report on the response
of stingless bees (Trigona carbonaria) towards the webs of the St. Andrew’s Cross spider (Argiope keyserlingi). We studied the ability of bees to avoid webs in different contexts: when bees were on their foraging path or when they
were returning to the hive as well as when they were flying North or South. We show that the probability of a bee being able
to avoid a web depends on the context of the bee’s flight rather than the visual appearance of the web. Furthermore, the presence
of the spider seems to alert the bee to the web, resulting in bees being more able to avoid capture. We show, specifically,
that the probability of being captured is higher when the bee is returning to the hive compared with when the bee is foraging.
The likelihood of avoiding a web is also influenced by the compass direction of the flight, although to a lesser extent. Our
results indicate that the context of the predator–prey encounter has a significant influence on a bee’s ability to escape
interception by a spider web. 相似文献
18.
An individual-oriented model is constructed which simulates the collective foraging behaviour of a colony of honey-bees,
Apis mellifera. Each bee follows the same set of behavioural rules. Each rule consists of a set of conditions followed by the behavioural
act to be performed if the conditions are fulfilled. The set of conditions comprises the state of external information available
to the bee (e.g. the dancing of other bees) and internal information variables (like memorised location of a food source and
homing motivation). The rules are partly observational (i.e. they capture the observable regularities between the present
external information and the individual bee's behaviour), and partly involve hypothesised internal-state variables (e.g. abandoning
tendency and homing motivation), because no observable (physiological) aspect has as yet been detected in the bee which correlates
with changes in the internal motivation. Our aim is to obtain a set of rules that is necessary and sufficient for the generation
of the collective foraging behaviour observed in real bees. We simulated an experiment performed by Seeley et al. in which
a colony of honey-bees chooses between two nectar sources of different profitabilities which are switched at intervals. A
good fit between observed and simulated collective forager patterns was obtained when the model included rules in which the
bees (1) relied on the information acquired from previous flights to a source (e.g. profitability and time of day when the
source was found), (2) used positional information obtained by attending recruitment dances and (3) did not abandon a (temporarily)
deteriorated source too fast or too slowly. The significance of the following issues is discussed: the role of internal and
external information, source profitability, the spatial precision of the dance communication, the ability to search for a
source after the source position has been transmitted, the tendency to abandon a deteriorated source, and the concepts of
scout, recruit, (un)employed forager, and foraging history.
Received: 26 January 1998 / Accepted after revision: 16 May 1998 相似文献
19.
Joseph M. Wunderle Jr. María Santa Castro N. Fetcher 《Behavioral ecology and sociobiology》1987,21(4):249-255
Summary Adult bananaquits on negative energy budgets were presented with a patch containing two flower types with identical mean rewards, but different variances. The flower patch contained a random array of 85 yellow and 85 red artificial flowers. Flowers of one color were filled with the same quantity of nectar (constant flowers); flowers of the other color were filled with variable quantities of nectar (variable flowers). In the first series of experiments the birds were given three presentations, followed by three more presentations with the flower colors reversed, to control for color preferences. Some individuals were occasionally indifferent during a presentation, but overall the birds significantly preferred the constant flowers. In the second series of experiments two birds were give five presentations of the floral patch during a day at a rate less than minimally required to meet all 24-h energy costs. In all experiments, bananaquits on negative energy budgets were either indifferent or risk-averse, but never risk-prone. The absence of risk-prone foraging might be attributed to resource dispersion pattern, reward skew, or a species characteristic. 相似文献
20.
We have found that foraging bumblebees (Bombus hortorum, B. pascuorum, B. pratorum and B.␣terrestris) not only avoid flowers of Symphytum officinale that have recently been visited by conspecifics but also those that have been recently visited by heterospecifics. We propose
that the decision whether to reject or accept a flower is influenced by a chemical odour that is left on the corolla by a
forager, which temporarily repels subsequent foragers. Honeybees and carpenter bees have previously been shown to use similar
repellent forage-marking scents. We found that flowers were repellent to other bumblebee foragers for approximately 20 min
and also that after this time nectar levels in S. officinale flowers had largely replenished. Thus bumblebees could forage more efficiently by avoiding flowers with low rewards. Flowers
to which extracts of tarsal components were applied were more often rejected by wild B. terrestris workers than flowers that had head extracts applied, which in turn were more often rejected than flowers that had body extracts
applied. Extracts from four Bombus species were equally repellent to foragers. The sites of production of the repellent scent and its evolutionary origins are
discussed.
Received: 24 November 1997 / Accepted after revision: 8 March 1998 相似文献