Bumblebees: their foraging behaviour and cognition

我的研究是关于大黄蜂的学习、认知和行为。这种方法是生态的，因为对寻找和开发食物来源的机制进行了调查。拟议研究的主要长期目标是(1)使用我们实验室开发的方法，追踪从工蜂第一次离开蜂群寻找食物到发现花蜜或花粉的行为轨迹：(A)在吸引大黄蜂到潜在食物来源方面，哪些花卉特征最重要？例如，另一只蜜蜂的存在是否有任何信号值？和(B)蜜蜂从失败的寻找食物的尝试中学到了什么？这项工作在强调非奖励在塑造蜜蜂行为中的作用方面是新的。(2)解决基本但未经检验的假设，即蜜蜂接近的视觉模式(如图画、照片)如果不是实际的花朵，则被视为花朵的代表。蜜蜂将接受图片-物体对应关系的测试：在对照片进行辨别训练后，它们将接受图片-对象转换的测试，反之亦然。这是大黄蜂认知的一个新领域，也是其他动物认知研究的一个肥沃领域，物种比较才刚刚开始。(3)开展物种分布和田间授粉的应用研究。在过去的10年里，大黄蜂的行为已经成为密集调查的对象，部分原因是它们作为传粉者的经济和社会价值，以及对世界范围内大黄蜂数量下降的担忧。我们记录了英国北部两种物种分布的变化：一种常见的物种似乎正在取代另一种。我们将扩大采样范围，记录栖息地和牧草特性。我们计划对乔治亚湾蓝莓作物疑似授粉不足进行实地研究：我们将测量蓝莓产量和蜜蜂行为，以应对蜜蜂密度的实验性操纵。这项工作直接关系到人类对粮食安全和物种保护的关注。这项研究与本科生和研究生的培养密不可分。

My research is on learning, cognition and behaviour in bumblebees. The approach is ecological in that the mechanisms of finding and exploiting food sources are investigated. The main long-term objectives of the proposed research are (1) to trace, using methods developed in our lab, the behavioural trajectory from the time that a worker first leaves the colony in search of food through to when she discovers nectar or pollen: (a) what floral characteristics are most important in attracting bumblebees to potential food sources? e.g. does the presence of another bee have any signal value? and (b) what do bees learn from failed attempts to locate food? This work is new in emphasizing the role of non-reward in shaping bee behaviour. (2) to address the fundamental but untested assumption that visual patterns (e.g. drawings, photos) approached by bees are perceived as representations of flowers if not actual flowers. Bees will be tested for picture-object correspondence: following discrimination training on photos, they will be tested for picture-to-object transfer and vice-versa. This is a new area in bumblebee cognition as well as a fertile area of investigation in other-animal cognition where species comparisons have barely begun. (3) to undertake applied research on species distributions and field pollination. Bumblebee behaviour has over the last 10 years become the object of intense investigation in part because of their economic and social value as pollinators and concerns over worldwide declines. We have documented a shift in the distribution of two species in Northern Britain: one common species seems to be replacing the other. We will expand our sampling area and record habitat and forage characteristics. We plan a field study on a suspected pollination deficit for blueberry crops in Georgian Bay: we will measure blueberry production and bee behaviour in response to experimental manipulations of bee densities. This work is directly tied to human concerns over food security and species conservation. This research is inextricably linked to the training of Undergraduate and Graduate students.