Teaching bumblebees to play fetch.

[Beth_B]

http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt...ould-a-bumblebee-learn-to-play-fetch-probably

Fascinating. This researcher is teaching bumblebees to perform activities they would never "naturally" do.
Insects might be smarter than we ever imagined!

 

[LIcenter]

I saw this on my local news last night. Think I'm gonna teach mine to fetch a cold one for me.

 

[zigs]

Lets just hope there's not a bee on the wall in the place they build the nuclear warheads

 

[MaryMary]

That is fascinating!! Thank you for sharing that!!

Think I'm gonna teach mine to fetch a cold one for me.

The article said they learn best by watching other bees, so I'd start with this one. Maybe you could tie a string to it and "float" it across the yard!

Insects might be smarter than we ever imagined!

Yes, and someday... they will be angry.

 

[LIcenter]

I like your style MaryMary.

 

[Daren]

I wish they could find the Door Instead of spending hours hitting there heads on my closed glass window. Great thread Love Bee's

 

[Becky]

Incredible creatures!

Research is showing more and more that animals — including tiny insects with 100,000 times fewer neurons than a human — can learn new skills quickly if their brains are wired right.

Bees, for example, can count. They can make decisions by weighing uncertainty, and can even learn to pull a string in order to reveal a hidden cache of sugar water.

All this new evidence for bees' mental flexibility is changing people's views of what insects are capable of.

I'm learning lots today

 

[Becky]

Video:

 

[zigs]

I've had more trouble getting labourers to do things than that.

 

[Daren]

I've had more trouble getting labourers to do things than that.

Don't tell me your getting all the sugar water Zigs ................ The hardest working Bee's always get the Honey

 

[zigs]

All I get is the wax

 

[Larisa]

He also tried to teach the bumblebee bring beer.

 

[MaryMary]

I have found more information on bumblebee training! If you watched the video @Becky posted, you saw that the bee will expend the least energy - it moved the ball closest to the target.

QUOTE:Researchers sent some bees into the arena with three balls at varying distances from the hole, and glued down the two closest ones, forcing the bees to roll the farthest ball. Those bees then trained other bees in the same scenario, but without any balls glued down. The teacher bees still rolled the farthest ball, thinking it was the only moveable one, so that's how the trainee bees learned the skill, too.

Yet when these trainees were later tested individually, they moved the closest ball instead of the farthest one, suggesting they'd learned the concept well enough to adapt it. And in another experiment, bees rolled a black ball into the hole even after being trained with a yellow ball, showing further flexibility. /QUOTE

More here - http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/animals/blogs/bumblebees-play-golf