Alan:  "In my experience, whenever a bee is squashed a nearby bee notices and gets to work, so age
may not be a factor in this task."

I agree.  Just like the "wax moths all freeze to death" idea...we should guard against dogma.  Tim has seen wax moth larvae crawling around at -40C in Alberta (which by the way is the temperature where F and C cross paths...i.e. the SAME!).  And this spring for the first time, I have seen lots of soil invertebrates active at below freezing temperatures.  So I can easily believe that honeybee castes are not so rigid that they cannot work on other jobs if necessary (maybe some nurse bee tasks excepted for anatomical reasons).

I bet all of us have seen bees that pitch in to whatever task is immediately required...even if their "temporal caste" doesn't include such.  For instance, guard bees get reinforcements at a moment's notice!

The proof of course is in the experiment...someone has to confirm this anecdotal evidence.

Christina

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