A new mode of learning: relay landscape learning in honey bees

Honey bees must learn how to navigate to their hive ("home") after completing foraging tasks. When returning foragers are released away from their home, many of them will successfully make it to their home, even if they only have foraged in that vicinity. We describe a new mode of learning whereby honey bees will learn and remember the landscape features of an area, while trying to find their way home. We term this "relay landscape" learning because honey bees are able to return home at a higher rate when they are released next to a place where they had been released and returned home successfully previously. We further prove that the relay works only if the two release points are 1 km apart, mainly because the radius for the reconnaissance flights is about 0.5 km. We also report using this assay for testing effects of insecticides on honey bee learning and memory (separate poster) and retention duration of this type of memory.