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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology

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Subject:
From:
Bill Hesbach <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Mon, 24 Jan 2022 10:31:12 -0500
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> A dancing drone can attract another drone to follow its dance and result in both drone followers and the drone flying off together. Unfortunately, there have been no subsequent studies of this interesting phenomenon.

There is literature on stingless bees that might help explain why drones would need to dance on comb assuming they are dancing to direct other drones to a new nest site.  Their reproductive biology is quite different than apis in that a new nest site is populated with drones first in anticipation of the swarm's arrival. 

From an article,  I wrote for ABJ about  a visit to Kenya  

The queens are not polyandrous and only mate once during a single mating session. Also, their swarm behavior is entirely different than Apis in that the colony first finds and establishes a new nest site and populates it with hundreds of drones. Then a virgin queen and many workers leave the mother colony and head for the new location. In time, the virgin initiates her mating pursued by a drone comet, and a single mating takes place. It's risky and dangerous, and queens can die, so the mother colony and the new colony maintain a relationship where backup virgins are supplied if needed until the new colony is queen-right. This backup supply of virgin queens has been observed to last up to six months. 



> The biology of the Stingless Bee Trigonu (Hypotrigona) gribodoi Magretti (Meliponidae) Bassindale, R & Harrison Matthews, L. (2009).

> Stingless Bee Nesting Biology
David W. Rubik
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, December 2005

Also Wille and Orozco 1975 - Observations on the Founding of a new colony by Trigoma Cupira

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