One to one care?

[Hombre]

Jurgen Tautz in his book, The buzz about bees says on page 207

". . . in which each new member of the colony is individually cared for by a brood nurse during it's development from larva, through the pupa to the adult bee".

This tends to infer a one to one relationship. What happens after bees are shaken off of brood frames during an inspection. Do these nurse bees re-establish the original relationship or form new ones and what happens to the pupa if nurse gets accidentally squished when a box is put back?

Flippant, perhaps; irrelevant, probably; but interesting, certainly!

Does any one have any ideas or opinions on this except perhaps Jurgen Tautz and his team?

This is an opportunity for the respected seniors of the forum to shine.

 

[Poly Hive]

First I have heard of this and it seems on the face of it unlikely.

However being a beekeeper and not a research PHD student spending hour upon hour studying an ob hive if they say it is then presumably they are peer regulated and it is so.

PH

 

[MrB]

Just got this book last week.
It is a facinating read and certainly food for thought.
not got to page 207 yet but wont take long as i can not put it down.

 

[m100]

I'd hazard a guess, having come across a number of similar instances in engineering documentation, that it is maybe a result of being translated from German to English. I'd love to be proved wrong though and if so it might change how I'd handle a frame in future.

 

[Black Comb]

It only infers it.
Reading from your quote it doesn't say it happens.

What about when you give a brood frame to another colony?

 

[Hombre]

Good point Peter, I hadn't thought about telepathy

I never gave it a thought that generally it might be a one to one relationship. The actual mechanism had previously not occurred to me although it can't be merely random. Certainly food for thought.

Enjoy your reading MrB, it is an interesting book. It seeks to fill in some things that haven't been understood previously, and yes PH lots of expensive kit to monitor this lot. If you haven't read it, it's well worth a look and would fit well in Santa's stocking.

I was amazed that the exact understanding of bee flight wasn't fully solved until as late as 2005. Constant frequency, variable geometry.

 

[Poly Hive]

"is individually cared for by a brood nurse" if it becomes:

"are individually cared for by brood nurses" the whole context changes and yes if the first is true then added frames would starve and that is just not the case so translation would seem the issue here.

PH