In message <[log in to unmask]>,
[log in to unmask] writes
>worker cells
>drawn one at a time in free space would also be round.
I read somewhere they are round if done by one bee. Crowded bees make
their cells the right distance apart (in relation to their body size)
centre to centre, so they have to make hexagonal cells in making the
shared walls - draw a series of circles that overlap perfectly and
you'll get hexagons. Actually, I regularly offer comb to children to ask
them what they see and then ask simple questions to get them to enlarge
on their answers. When a boy said he saw a 5-sided cell, I did not
contradict - as mothers usually do (and this one did) I asked to be
shown it - sure enough he had found one of the very few transitional
cells that actually had 5 sides - a quite good looking pentagon.
--
James Kilty