Abdomen flipping of Apis dorsata breviligula worker bees correlated with temperature of nest curtain surface

Abstract

Apis laboriosa and Apis dorsata worker bees in the curtain covering the nest comb perform dorso-ventral abdomen flipping (AF). Relationship between percentage of bees performing AF and the nest surface temperature (t c) or ambient temperature (ta) was investigated on A. dorsata breviligula nests in the Philippines. When both temperatures dropped down the %AF increased. Partial correlation showed, that the correlations between %AF and tc were about 4 times higher than between %AF and ta. This support the hypothesis that worker bees of the mantle of the curtain, which perform AF, react rather to the temperature around them in the surface of the curtain than to ambient temperature some distance apart. © INRA/DIB-AGIB/ EDP Sciences, 2006.