Imperfect comb construction reveals the architectural abilities of honeybees

Honeybees are renowned for their perfectly hexagonal honeycomb, hailed as the pinnacle of biological architecture for its ability to maximize storage area while minimizing building material. However, in natural nests, workers must regularly transition between different cell sizes, merge inconsistent combs, and optimize construction in constrained geometries. These spatial obstacles pose challenges to workers building perfect hexagons, but it is unknown to what extent workers act as architects versus simple automatons during these irregular building scenarios. Using automated image analysis to extract the irregularities in natural comb building, we show that some building configurations are more difficult for the bees than others, and that workers overcome these challenges using a combination of building techniques, such as: intermediate-sized cells, regular motifs of irregular shapes, and gradual modifications of cell tilt. Remarkably, by anticipating these building challenges, workers achieve high-quality merges using limited local sensing, on par with analytical models that require global optimization. Unlike automatons building perfectly replicated hexagons, these building irregularities showcase the active role that workers take in shaping their nest and the true architectural abilities of honeybees.

Absconding Behavior and Management of Apis cerana F. Honeybee in Chitwan, Nepal

Twelve colonies of five-framed Apis cerana F. with about equal brood, hive storage and colony strength were prepared in November 2004 and the colony development parameters recorded. One-third of the colonies absconded in summer and about one-sixth in rainy season, while non-absconded colonies also slowed comb building, brood rearing, colony strength and hive storage in summer and rainy seasons. Feeding sugar candy and pollen substitute prevented absconding in May and July. Three weeks feeding in May resulted higher comb building (15.0%), higher brood rearing (158.8%), stronger colony strength (15.0%) and higher hive storage (171.2% honey, 270.9% pollen) in June. Those colonies having higher brood mite (Varroa jacobsoni Oud.) in winter absconded earlier. Key words: Apis cerana, absconding, brood mite, pollen substitute, colony management J. Inst. Agric. Anim. Sci. 27:77-86 (2006)

Response of Colony Strength to Honey Production: Regression and Correlation Analysis

An experiment was conducted using Randomized Complete Block (RCB) design to find the effects of initial colony strength of Apis mellifera L. on honey production with four levels of initial populations: 4 frames (9,800), 6 frames (14,700), 8 frames (19,600) and 10 frames (24,500) of adult honeybees per colony replicating 5 times during litchi flowering season (February to April, 2003) in Chitwan. This study revealed the exponential increase in honey production {Y = 4.22 – 0.7325 X + 0.09625 X2 (4 ≤X ≤ 10 comb covered by bees per colony) and Y = 4.22 – 0.000299 X + 0.000000016 X2 (9,800 ≤ X ≤ 24,500 honeybees per colony), n = 4} producing 2.32, 1.59 and 1.18 times more honey from initially 10-, 8- and 6-frame colonies as compared to the honey production of 2.82 kg/colony from 4-frame colonies. There was significantly positive linear correlation among colony attributes like colony strength, brood rearing, comb building, foraging activity and honey production. Key words: Apis mellifera, honey bee population, colony attributes J. Inst. Agric. Anim. Sci. 27:133-137 (2006)