Hi all
It's generally known that honey bees dance to indicate the direction to nectar sources but they also dance when preparing to abscond, or migrate.
> All species of tropical honeybees studied to date that undergo seasonal movements have been found to perform modified waggle dances that are referred to as ‘‘absconding dances’’ or ‘‘migration dances’’. Such dances have been reported for Apis florea, A. dorsata, A. cerana and A. mellifera scutellata.
> The dances differ from the more familiar waggle dances associated with foraging, in that the waggle runs are arrhythmic and slow paced, lack the return runs of foraging dances, and may not stimulate immediate recruitment.
> Also, the consecutive waggle runs performed by the same bee differ markedly in duration and communicate highly variable distances that far exceed the normal foraging range of the species. However, absconding dances main- tain a consistent orientation and often communicate the same general direction, which tends to be the direction the entire colony travels when it absconds
> It seems apparent that in all absconding/migratory species of honeybees studied to date, there is a special dance associated with this type of colony movement that does not appear to select specific destinations but rather may help to prepare colonies to fly in a particular direction in search of a new nesting area.
Duangphakdee, O., Hepburn, H. R., Radloff, S. E., Pirk, C. W. W., Rodim, P., & Wongsiri, S. (2012).
Waggle dances in absconding colonies of the red dwarf honeybee, Apis florea. Insectes sociaux, 59(4), 571-577.
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