When a hive gets too crowded, half the bees (together with the queen) swarm temporarily to a nearby tree to wait while several hundred go and scout for a new home. But how do they decide which site is best?
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Photo by Amanda Greenslade
Researchers at Cornell University have now documented that the bees go through a group decision-making process, steadily narrowing down the options until a quorum develops.1,2 It’s long been known that honeybee scouts ‘waggle dance’ to report on food.3Researchers have now confirmed that they dance to report on real estate, too—the better the housing site, the stronger the waggle dance, and that prompts other scouts to visit the site.
