TARGET-DIRECTED ORIENTATION IN DISPLACED HONEYBEES

Under sunny weather conditions, displaced honeybees (Apis mellifera) u sually fly into the celestial compass direction and thus may be misled from their goal, or they are disorientated. Under cloudy conditions, they may determine the celestial compass direction from prominent land marks. They may also fly directly toward their goal from a release sir e. In two experiments, we investigated the orientation of displaced be es when a landmark (target) was close to the goal under different weat her conditions. It is shown that in sunny conditions, the celestial co mpass will override target orientation under most conditions. Under 10 0% cloud cover, the celestial compass direction retrieved from landmar ks modulates target-orientated behaviour but is not by itself a primar y orientation factor. The bees will fly toward a previously encountere d landmark that signals the target, and in case of several similar lan dmarks which are visible to the bees, they will choose the one in the direction nearest the celestial compass direction. The results indicat e that honeybee orientation is the result of a set of context-specific interdependent orientation mechanisms.