Bumblebees (Bombus terrestris) use social information as an indicator of safety in dangerous environments.
Avoiding predation is one of the most important challenges that an animal faces. Several anti-predation behaviours can be employed, yet simply using the presence of conspecifics can be a good signal of safety in an environment with potential predation hazards. Here, we show, for the first time, that past experience of predation causes bumblebees (Bombus terrestris) to aggregate with conspecifics, facilitating the identification of safe foraging patches. Bees were trained to differentiate between flowers that harboured predators and flowers that were predator free. When test subjects were subsequently presented solely with the previously predator-infested flower species, there was a significant preference to only land on flowers occupied by other feeding conspecifics. Yet, when safe flowers were made available to subjects previously entrained to discriminate safe from predator-occupied flowers, subjects ignored other bees and the social information potentially provided by them, demonstrating that attraction towards conspecifics is confined to dangerous situations. Our findings demonstrate a previously unknown social interaction in pollinators which may have important implications for plant-pollinator interactions.
Biological and Experimental Psychology, School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London, , Mile End Road, London E1 4NS, UK.
Erika H
EH
Dawson
Lars
L
Chittka
D000818:Animals; D001516:Bees / Q000502:physiology*; D004777:Environment; D035264:Flowers; D020387:Food Chain; D009426:Netherlands; D054817:Pollination; D012919:Social Behavior
bumblebees; group formation; predator avoidance; social information; social learning