Krausa Kathrin, Hager Felix A, Kirchner Wolfgang H
Behavioural Biology and Biology Education, Ruhr University Bochum, Universitätsstraße 150, 44780 Bochum, Germany.
International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (icipe), Nairobi P.O. Box 30772-00100, Kenya.
Insects. 2021 Apr 29;12(5):395. doi: 10.3390/insects12050395.
Flower visiting stingless bees store collected pollen and nectar for times of scarcity. This stored food is of high value for the colony and should be protected against con- and heterospecifics that might rob them. There should be high selective pressure on the evolution of mechanisms to discriminate nestmates from non-nestmates and to defend the nest, i.e., resources against intruders. Multimodal communication systems, i.e., a communication system that includes more than one sensory modality and provide redundant information, should be more reliable than unimodal systems. Besides olfactory signals, vibrational signals could be used to alert nestmates. This study tests the hypothesis that the vibrational communication mode plays a role in nest defense and nestmate recognition of . Substrate vibrations induced by bees were measured at different positions of the nest. The experiments show that guarding vibrations produced in the entrance differ in their temporal structure from foraging vibrations produced inside the nest. We show that guarding vibrations are produced during non-nestmate encounters rather than nestmate encounters. This further supports the idea that guarding vibrations are a component of nest defense and alarm communication. We discuss to whom the vibrations are addressed, and what their message and meaning are.
访花无刺蜂会储存采集到的花粉和花蜜以备食物短缺之时。这些储存的食物对蜂群具有很高的价值，应该受到保护，防止同种或异种个体前来抢夺。在进化出区分巢友和非巢友以及保卫蜂巢（即抵御入侵者保护资源）的机制方面，应该存在很高的选择压力。多模态通讯系统，即一种包含不止一种感官模态并提供冗余信息的通讯系统，应该比单模态系统更可靠。除了嗅觉信号外，振动信号也可用于提醒巢友。本研究检验了这样一个假设，即振动通讯模式在蜂巢防御和巢友识别中发挥作用。在蜂巢的不同位置测量了蜜蜂引起的基质振动。实验表明，在入口处产生的警戒振动在时间结构上与在蜂巢内部产生的觅食振动不同。我们发现警戒振动是在遇到非巢友时而不是巢友时产生的。这进一步支持了警戒振动是蜂巢防御和警报通讯的一个组成部分的观点。我们讨论了这些振动是针对谁的，以及它们传递的信息和含义是什么。
