In-hive water management

[Sutty]

There have been numerous references on multiple threads of bees being able to make use of condensation to dilute their honey stores.
Although this would seem an obvious thing to do, is there any evidence that they actually do it (eg from observation hives)?
After all some of their water seeking behaviour seems odd - flying a distance to water sources when it's raining and there is water at the hive entrance!

 

[Roger.Wilco]

water at the hive entrance

For my sins - I have Abelo hives which have a landing protrusion in front of the entrance. I've often seen bees of a morning out on the landing board with their proboscis in water drops. I figured either they were either drying the landing or drinking the water. The hives also have a plastic "U" channel holding the frame ends - and during inspection the "U" channels often contain water with bees swimming. I figured that either they were there having a bath or were drinking and fell in when I was manipulating the frames.

These are just observations so I cannot say for sure.

flying a distance to water sources

I was reading in a book; that supposedly waggle dances are inexact when the distance to a resource is under 10m from the hive so I guess it could be that it is difficult to communicate to other bees - that water is available "10cm from their nose"; whereas, communicating water is "40m North" may be easier.

Someone with more knowledge may have a better answer.