Converting the stimuli of the surrounding environment into information is a fundamental characteristic for surviving in a world full of dangers and daily challenges. But the ability to send this data to other individuals is an advantage that makes life easier for the population. In man, the possibility of communicating in a complex way has allowed a rapid evolution, and a development of his abilities (social, technical, creative ..). Not surprisingly, the ability to speak and have an articulate language are considered fundamental characteristics of our evolution. Exceptional communication skills have also been found in other “superior” animals. For example, let’s consider Koko, the gorilla who could communicate about 2000 words with sign language. The ability to associate a certain situation or stimulus was tested by Francine Patterson and other researchers.
But this was only an artificial case, that is, given by training. Let’s move on to something more natural ..
The communication of bees
Bees have a very elaborate communication system. These animals will never use this type of language to compliment each other (perhaps), however, it can be a significant evolutionary advantage when it comes to resources. In fact, the bee dance is a particular behavior that identifies the position and quality of a resource, such as a flower or a sugar source. Studied primarily by Karl von Frisch , Nobel laureate together with Konrad Lorenz and Nikolaas Tinbergen in 1973, this type of communication has shown that even in invertebrates there is a way to communicate information in a complex way. The length of the wagging phase, the width of the circles, the direction and intensity of the “ wagging ””Is information that is encoded by the other foragers. The bee not only transmits spatial information, but also on the quality of the resource.
The dance of the bees takes place with the classic shape of 8, or infinity. The old idea was that there was also another type of dance, the circular one, to convey the position of nearby resources, but many scholars agree that this is simply a variant of the dance at 8, as it retains its characteristics.
In general, the dance of the bees has a verse that must be translated on the horizontal plane from the vertical. For those who have never seen a hive, the wax sheets, and the subsequent constructions of the workers, are arranged vertically with respect to the plane. A bee that transmits information will consequently communicate it vertically.
How do bees know where they need to go?
Let’s imagine an imaginary axis that passes precisely in the center of a circle vertically. The bee will dance with a certain direction, creating a certain angle with the noon of our axis. This angle represents the angle that the foragers must keep with respect to the Sun to find the resource. The verse is given simply by the verse that holds the dance.
When a forager finds a new food resource, she returns to the nest and makes contact with other bees in the hive. These arrange themselves in a circle, and test the information that the forager is transmitting. The orientation of the others is not 100% accurate, because the information given is coarse and indicates an area in which to look. The search is all the more precise the sooner the others set in motion to look for the resource, but it is still amazing to consider that a worker who receives the information the night before can find her way around the next morning. This ability is only possible if the animal has temporal knowledge, in this case of the motion of the Sun.
What is not good for the hive is not good for the bee either. (Marcus Aurelius)
A very interesting curiosity that has been discovered is that of the choice to follow information or not. A hive has thousands of individuals and not all foragers convey correct information. In fact, it has been observed that the other workers prefer to follow the information of an elderly bee rather than a young one.
The dance of bees is a very complex language that allows you to appreciate even more these animals, essential for the life of our Planet.