When Public Crises Arrive, How Bees Respond – The Wisdom of Bees is Indeed Simple
After friends who have a certain understanding of the biological characteristics of bees, they all have a feeling that bees are very intelligent insects. In the bee group, there are sometimes behaviors that are difficult for even higher animals to understand. For example, the honeycomb, from a geometric perspective and from an architectural perspective, all reflect high academicity. More deeply, in fact, the honeycomb also hides a deeper communication principle.
Although bees are considered to have the highest level of evolution among invertebrates, they are still seen as small insects by humans. However, the management and defense methods of bees can be said to be able to reach what humans have evolved for countless years. For example, the 'poison tasting' (where the bee colony first feeds a bee about to die with an unidentified food) habit, even for higher animals, may require countless years of evolution to think of it.
Bees that friends have seen know that bees live in bee colonies. In fact, a bee colony is not a family, and a bee colony belongs to multiple families. The reason is that when the queen bee is mating, she does not only mate with one male bee, but with multiple male bees. The queen bee stores multiple male bees' sperm, and uses them lifelong. Moreover, the bee colony also produces three types of bees according to different bee eggs, which makes it easy for us to imagine.
In fact, the bees in a bee colony are not all 'brothers and sisters'. A bee colony consists of multiple second families. For example, the queen bee uses the sperm of one male bee to produce these male bees and worker bees, and these male bees and worker bees are 'brothers and sisters' by blood. But if the queen bee uses the sperm of another male bee, then their relationship becomes 'mother and father but not brothers and sisters', and the male bees are developed from unfertilized eggs, so they are all 'brothers and sisters' with all the worker bees, but without a father.
You can see a bee colony's bees are not necessarily 'family members' as we understand them. Instead, they are composed of multiple second families, and these families together constitute their kingdom.
With our understanding of bees, it seems that bees live in bee colonies, and each colony only manages its own 'country'. No matter what problems other bee colonies encounter, other bee colonies will not interfere.After bees have been artificially cultivated, a large number of bee colonies have gathered together. We can more clearly observe the bee colony and discovered many secrets. This bee, which lives in a bee colony, may be more intelligent than we imagined. We can see it from the following aspects.
1. Independent life of the bee colony
2. Bee colony attack on dogs
3. Can the bee colony respond to public crises?
Independent life of the bee colony
For the independent life of the bee colony, we are all familiar with. Even if we put two boxes of bees together, as long as the distance is not too close, the two boxes of bees will live their own lives. No matter what a bee colony experiences, as long as it does not affect other bee colonies, other bee colonies will not show any abnormalities, which is like each bee colony only cares about its own 'country', unless the whole society encounters a crisis, such as the most common bee theft.
① Mild bee theft:Mild bee theft refers to when there is no external honey source, a bee colony steals honey from another bee colony.This process will trigger a fight between two bee colonies, and seriously, it can lead to the stolen bee colony fleeing or the entire colony being wiped out. This is like a war between bee worlds, and generally, the number of bee colonies involved is small, and the consequences are that a small number of bee colonies are extinct or flee, but the reasons for causing such consequences are not that bees themselves are aggressive, but that bees cannot find honey sources. If there is enough honey source outside, there will be no intersection between bee colonies, and each bee colony will live its own life.
② Severe bee theft:For severe bee theft, it is said to be peaceful stealing with Flat stealing. This is equivalent to a war between bee worlds.Since the identification of bees in the bee colony is based on the smell of bees, if the smell of all bees in the bee yard is the same, and there is no external honey source, the bees will steal honey from other bee colonies. Since the smell is the same, the bees can hardly distinguish each other, so the bees move honey from one bee colony to another, and the bees die of exhaustion. This is like a war between bee worlds, and generally, the number of bee colonies involved is small, and the consequences are that a small number of bee colonies are extinct or flee.
Strictly speaking, the bee tribe believes that peaceful stealing is unprecedented in the natural world, because natural bees often collect different honey sources in the bee colony to distinguish themselves from other bee colonies. As long as other bee colonies' bees enter, the guarding bees will quickly discover them. However, due to the artificial cultivation of bees and artificial feeding, the time of artificial feeding bees is generally during the honey-deficient period, and the food fed to the bees is the most common white sugar water.
Because each bee colony feeds white sugar water, resulting in the same smell in each bee colony, and at the honey-deficient period, the bees bring with them aggression, so they steal each other's honey, and each other cannot recognize them, and finally die of exhaustion. This is like a war between bee worlds, and generally, the number of bee colonies involved is small, and the consequences are that a small number of bee colonies are extinct or flee. This is a huge loss to our bee farming industry. The reason for this phenomenon is not that bees are aggressive, but that humans are too powerful.
Bee colony's response to public crises
Once the bee tribe was curious, whether there is no relationship between bee colonies in the bee world, that is, when facing public crises, are the bee colonies responding individually or jointly?
In the bee tribe's bee yard, the found a problem. A family in our village raises a dog. This dog often passes through the bee yard. When the bee yard was just established, the dog was just curious and ran into the bee yard. Soon, the dog was stung and face was destroyed. After that, whenever the dog passes through the bee yard, it always goes around a long distance. In this process, there is a problem that the bee tribe is curious, that is, when the bees sting the dog, the attack is actually launched by multiple bee colonies to the dog. The is curious, are these bees attacking the dog together, or is the dog attacked by one bee colony each time it passes through the bee yard?
If the dog is attacked by one bee colony, other bee colonies will not attack, this is a bee colony's independent attack problem. But ifdala dog is attacked by multiple bee colonies, it will cause more serious crises.
It seems that bees in a bee colony have changed their habits when facing extreme crises, so that the race can continue.
About the bee theft phenomenon, the believes that this is one of the ways that the bee colony responds to public crises.
Why does bee theft appear in early autumn? The main reason is that in summer, the temperature is high, and the bees have tolerated it. Because the beekeeper has no experience, the bees are hungry, in fact, the bees have had a run-away mood in summer. But in summer, because of the high temperature, there is no external honey source, so the bees will not run away, waiting for the time to appear.
The suitable time is early autumn, at this time, the external temperature is decreasing, and the flowering plants are beginning to bloom. The bees run away and can find food, so some bee colonies run away, and it seems that they are waiting for a leader. Once a bee colony runs away, other bee colonies will follow, flying out of the hive and mixing with other bee colonies, collectively running away.
As for why bees cause bee theft when they collectively run away, the believes that this is because the bee colony's worker bees protect their queen bees, because the queen bee is the reproductive basis of the bee colony, and the worker bees will protect her desperately. The large number of bees mixed together will inevitably cause other bee colonies' worker bees to approach their queen, so there is a fight.In fact, when the bees collectively run away, the bee theft is contrary to the bee's living habits, so that the race can continue.How do you think about this?
Welcome to share your opinion below.
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