Natural History of the Honeybee. 



THE LOSS OF MEMORY FOR LOCALITY THROUGH SWARM DIZZINESS, ETC. 



Through swarm dizziness, as well as through stupefaction (as before mentioned), 

 memory pictures are extinguished, or, at least, are without influence. 



If a so-called artificial swarm is made by sweeping the bees from the frames of a 

 strong colony with their queen into a new hive placed upon a new stand, then all the 

 flying bees return to the original hive, and only the young bees remain in the new one 

 with the queen. In a genuine swarm, on the other hand, all the bees remain in the dwelling 

 of their choice. They have forgotten their old dwelling. But it is not a complete for- 

 getting, for, if a swarm becomes queenless within the first few days, then the bees 

 return to the mother colony— the memory for the old home is reawakened. The extinc- 

 tion of the memory for locality is not, therefore, as final as in narcotization, etc. The 

 old nerye-paths are maintained, but are no longer traveled over, because there is a diversion 

 into other nerve-paths; but if the stronger influences are removed by queenlessness (Weisel- 

 unruhe, see p. 12), then the old-trodden paths come into effect again and adjust the 

 direction of the stimuli in the former way; i. e., earlier memory pictures are reawakened 

 and the bees return to the mother colony. 



An extinction of the memory of locality is brought about likewise by the apparently 

 narcotic influence of buckwheat honey 79 in the cases mentioned before. 



Also bees kept in a dark room for many days, and those numbed with cold M appear 

 to lose their earlier memory for locality to a certain extent. Further, the throwing of 

 bees into water, the bathing of a colony, will cause the disappearance of the acquired 

 power of orientation. 81 A colony thus handled can be placed in a different position with- 

 out a return to the accustomed place of flight. Time has a substantial influence upon the 

 disappearance of memory pictures too. In approximately five or six weeks, or often 

 sooner, bees removed to a new position forget the influences of the old place. After this 

 length of time the hive can be changed back and put in any chosen position of the old 

 location without fear of the bees seeking the original spot. Memories disappear quickly 

 if new impressions obliterate the old. If bees stay in a hive, wintering for months, there- 

 fore receiving no new place impressions, the impressions which were received before the 

 wintering commenced remain. In very many cases it can be determined certainly whether 

 a transference shortly before the first spring flight can be undertaken without much loss 

 to the colony. If the first weather for flying is inauspicious, as is; generally the case, and 

 the temperature scarcely reaches the 7° to 8° C. in the shade necessary for flight, the 

 bees fly out, lingering for only a short flight with slow orientation, and execute the neces- 

 sary cleaning. They thereby impress upon themselves the new position. But if, as happens 

 now and then, after a long period of cold, a relatively very warm spring day breaks in, 

 the excitement in the hive is great; thousands press forth, and many hasten off for a longer 

 flight with only a hasty, careless orientation. Under such circumstances a greater or less 

 number, in coming back, return to the old place. 



Francois Huber 82 reports that in the fall he had fed some honey to great numbers of 

 bees from a window; then the honey was taken away and the hives were kept closed all 



return to the feeding-place, in spite of the fact that food is still present. Very significant for this view 

 is the following account by the well-known writer in apiculture, and editor of the Bienen Zeitung, Wilhelm 

 Vogel: "When I was a boy a beekeeper told my father, under the seal of secrecy, that a colony would 

 swarm in a few days if it were given daily a quart of honey. I immediately placed a dish of honey over 

 my strongest colony during the buckwheat-honey flow. After eight good days of forage the bees hadi not 

 touched the honey, although it was pure." (Bienen Zeitung, 1880, p. 10.) I might mention, likewise, that 

 the statements of Lubbock and Hermann Muller, about the pretended incapability of bees of not again 

 finding the placed honey will be explained through the mentioned characteristics of bees. The "slight 

 ability" of bees accepted by these investigators is, therefore, not proven through these investigations. In 

 a dearth of honey, on the contrary, the bee is very able to trace out places where extra-floral honey is to 

 be discovered. 



79 If the buckwheat-honey flow is strong, then the bees seem to be unmistakably intoxicated, and they 

 go into the nearest hive-entrance with filled honey-sacs. The observation has been made that hives which 

 are passed over by bees from hives standing further back increase perceptibly in population and honey 

 at the cost of the hives behind" (Bw. Centralblatt, Nr. 3, p. 35, 1894) . 



80 Deutscher Bienenfreund, 35 Jahrg. 1899, Nr. 4. 



81 Francois Huber, 1. c. In men, after a violent illness, after a concussion of the brain, after stupefi- 

 cation, after poisoning with carbon dioxide, etc., a loss of memory and retrograde amnesia occurs (Aug. 

 Forel, Das Gedachtnis und seine Abnormitaten, p. 37, ff . ; Zurich, 1885; A. Goldscheider, Die Bedeutung 

 der Reize im Lichte der Neuronlehre, p. 28, ff . ; Leipzig, 1898). 



82 Nouvelles Observations sur les Abeilles, 2d edition; 2 vol., Paris and Geneva, 1814; German by 

 Kleine, Einbeck, 1856; English editions in 1823 and 1841. 



