Honey Bee Communication Through the Waggle Dance

I am currently reading Honeybee Democracy by Thomas Seeley.
What a delightful book! I love it because I am fascinated by bees, but I think even a non-beekeeper would be intrigued by Seeley's way of presenting how honey bees make decisions about the welfare and growth of the hive as a whole.

Seeley writes so comfortably that I feel like I am in conversation with him. He doesn't throw around scientific wisdom, but instead conveys his knowledge in such a way that it feels casual and easy to understand.

If you have the opportunity to read this book, you'll think about swarms and swarm intelligence in so much clearer a way. Seeley shines a light for us all on how the honeybee communicates about choice of living space for a swarm and how these decisions are made in the swarm.

I find honeybee communication fascinating. Most of it takes place in the dark of the hive (note hives are completely dark - no windows.) And yet the honeybee communicates by dancing. I assume since she can't be seen dancing, her movements are felt by her sisters. We always see drawings or film of the honey bee dancing visibly, but that is not the case in the hive.

I opened my email this morning to find a note from Tucker Balch at Georgia Tech. Among his many interests and talents, he works with robotics and in that interest began studying honeybees. He has made an enlightening video about the waggle dance that I have loved watching (I've seen it three times just today!) His interest is in understanding the role of communication in the bee hive.

Here is his video about honeybee communication via the waggle dance, more clearly explained than anywhere else I've ever seen it. He repeated Von Frisch's experiment of years ago. I encourage you to click on the lower right corner of the YouTube screen to make the video full screen:

Presentation at St. Dunstan's Vacation Bible School

Today my grandson, Dylan, and I went to present about bees at a Vacation Bible School at St. Dunstan's Episcopal Church in Atlanta. We took my friend, Julia's, observation hive.

Trying to get the hive to the car today was a much bigger challenge than the last time I used it. I had about 25 bees loose in Julia's house before we got everything squared away to take the Ob Hive to the car. There has to be an easier way. I spent about 20 minutes covered the bees with a glass and sliding a card under the glass to take them to the outdoors to release them.

We did the talk outside and set the hive up on a picnic table. I also took a medium nuc (the blue box), bee veils, honey for them to taste, and candles to feel and smell. We talked about the comb in the hive and they got to do the waggle dance. It was a lot of fun for me and I think the participants had fun too.


One of the teenage counselors took these two pictures. The first is of Dylan and me as we got started talking about the bees.

Here are the children learning to do the waggle dance to communicate!

This young man, Conner, was eager to try on a veil and to ask lots of questions.

Dylan who is only 3 was a fabulous helper and got a promised Brewster's ice cream cone as a reward when we left!

We returned the observation hive to Julia's with only two bees to return to the outdoors before we came home.

Visiting Clairmont Elementary School

Yesterday I started my day in Clairmont Elementary School in the Pre-K class. There were 18 kids there who had learned a lot about ants and now wanted to learn about bees.

I had so much fun. The children tried on two bee veils that I passed around.



Here is my friend Tracy's daughter, Ella, looking snappy in her bee veil and gloves. Tracy, her dad, had bees in his family when he was a kid. Ella was my assistant and helped in so many ways during the presentation.



We talked about how beekeepers put the bees in boxes and about how the bees build and live in honeycomb. They liked hearing that the bees don't wipe their feet when they come inside the house so after a while the comb isn't white any longer but is dirty and brown from bee footprints.



We all did the circle dance and the waggle dance together.

Then before I left everyone got to taste honey. I had a great time and I think they did too. One of the joys of bee-ing a beekeeper is getting to share information with other people.

Visiting a Preschool

Here is my grandson Dylan in his bee veil. He showed his friends at preschool today how he is protected from the bees when Grandma works in the beeyard.


Today I was lucky enough to get to go talk about bees at my grandson's preschool. The class members were betwee 2 and 3 years old!

They got to feel honeycomb.



They tried on Dylan's bee veil.



They tasted honey on popsicle sticks.



And they did the waggle dance - I didn't get a picture of that because I was dancing with them!