I’ve always admired bees, but before I admired them from a safe distance. We have all heard of how bees are nature’s tireless workers, buzzing from flower to flower in a golden blur of determination. But until I started studying them, I had no idea just how clever they really are. If you picture ‘intelligence’ in the animal world, you probably think of dolphins, crows, or even primates. But bees and insects? Mostly they are just see as instinct-driven creatures, with little ability to make conscious decisions. Yet, beneath those delicate wings and fuzzy little bodies lies a brain, all be it a brain no bigger than a single grain of sand. But nonetheless, it’s a brain capable of amazing things!
Bees Can Count (Sort of)
If you put a few dots on a board and show them to a bee, they can tell the difference. For my study I used a combination of one, two, three, and even four dots. In the scientific community we call this quantity discrimination, and it’s a skill that’s been studied in species such as monkeys and birds. In fact, my research showed that honeybees are faster decision-makers than bumblebees when it comes to figuring out quantities. However, to be clear bees quantity discrimination ability isn’t quite the same as math, but imagine a bee choosing the flower with the most nectar simply by recognizing which one has more petals. It’s a clever little trick that helps them get the most out of foraging trips. And if that wasn’t impressive enough, bees can even understand zero. Yes, you read that right. Some studies have shown that bees can grasp the concept of “nothing,” which is something even young children struggle with. That’s some serious brainpower packed into such a tiny head!
Bees, do they know where they are going?
Imagine being dropped in an unfamiliar city with no map, no phone, and no one to ask for directions. I know I wouldn’t be able to find my way home, at least not without any help. However bees, once again, seem to have a surprising accuracy when it comes to directional navigation. They do it every day, and its even more impressive when you think of how far a tiny bee travels from its hive in search of pollen. During my research I learned that insects use a mix of landmarks, the suns position, and even the earth’s magnetic field to find their way around. But what fascinated me the most is their ability to remember the best routes to food sources and optimize their journeys. Kind of like a built-in GPS, which at times I wish I had too! During my investigation I tested the bees ability to spatially navigate to landmarks, and both honeybee and bumblebees showed that they could learn and adapt over time. Admittedly, honeybees were the faster learners. Honeybees made quicker decisions about which routes to take, proving that their navigation skills are fine-tuned for efficiency. Though both of my bee species weren’t easily fooled by novel landmarks I threw at them and knew exactly what to look out for to get a tasty sugar water reward.
Bees Can Solve Puzzles (and they Cheat!)
One of my favourite things about bees is their problem-solving ability. Why? Because the ability to problem solve is cognitive ability that is advanced and commonly seen in large brained species such as primates. So this fining of mine is quite exciting! In a small handful of experiments, bees have been trained to pull strings to get food, navigate mazes, and even copy each other’s tricks to reach rewards. In the wild, this means they can learn how to access tricky flowers, pushing, pulling, or even biting into them to reach the nectar inside. But here’s the funny part, bees sometimes cheat! If a flower is too hard to access, a clever bee might skip the whole process and bite a hole at the base of the petal to steal the nectar. It’s called nectar robbing, and while it’s not exactly polite, it does show how adaptable they are. During my testing as well there was many times when bees would get impatient in the trap box waiting to go into the testing maze, and some even seemed to figure out how to slide the little door at the box to escape. But that’s something to test another time!
Bees Have Self-Control
If you put a delicious snack in front of a child and tell them they can have two if they wait a little longer, many kids will give in to temptation and grab the first treat. This idea, delaying gratification, is called inhibitory control, and it’s often used as a sign of ‘intelligence’. I am proud to say that my clever bees also show this self-control. In my research, I tested how well honeybees and bumblebees could resist taking the direct route to a tasty reward by placing up a tricky barrier. The bees had to walk away from the direct path and the reward in order to get around the barrier and access it. Honeybees, once again, outperformed their bumblebee cousins. They were better at holding back their impulses and making the tricky detour. If only I had the same level of willpower when it comes to eating cake!
Check out more about the waggle dance with this video by BBC Earth
Can Bees Communicate Complex Ideas?
While I was studying bee cognition, one thing became clear: they don’t just think, they talk. Okay, not talk the way we do, but bees have their own sophisticated dance language. It’s called the waggle dance, and it’s how honeybees tell each other where to find food.
The dance works like this:
🐝 The bee waggles its body while moving in a figure-eight pattern.
🌞 The angle of the dance tells the other bees the direction of the food in relation to the sun.
📏 The length of the dance tells them how far away it is.
It’s basically a bee GPS system—all communicated through tiny, precise dance moves. While this wasn’t something I tested directly it was something my study relied on. After all I could only study twenty bees at a time and in a hive there is hundreds. I needed bees to communicate with each other the rewarding landmarks I have made for them. I can safely say that my bees did learn over time and so maybe there is something to be said for speaking through dance.
So, What Does This All Mean?
For a long time people have assumed insects were simple creatures, driven purely by instinct. But the more we study bees and other insects, the clearer it becomes that they are so much more than tiny workers in a hive. They learn. They remember. They solve problems. They make choices. And, perhaps most importantly, they show us that ‘intelligence’ isn’t about brain size.🐝✨
Love from,
An Earth Nerd
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