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Dynamic Balancing Of Foraging And Defensive Effort Contribute To The Optimality Of The Honey Bee Robbing Strategy, Grayson James Grume

Theses and Dissertations--Entomology

The optimality of a foraging strategy shifts in response to dynamic ecological conditions and the need to devote effort to other tasks. Nest defense and foraging effort in the honey bee may trade off as both tasks are performed by a shared workforce of physiologically-specialized individuals in exclusive roles. Honey robbing is a foraging strategy predicted to benefit from simultaneous increases in foraging and defensive effort, but may be constrained by workforce specialization. We developed a methodology to induce robbing behaviors with uninhabited bait hives. We used this methodology to evaluate foraging and defensive effort before and during robbing by …