Study
The flight paths of honeybees recruited by the waggle dance
Riley, Joseph R.; Greggers, Uwe; Smith, Alan D.; Reynolds, Don R.; Menzel, Randolf
Nature, 2005
Bees that had watched a waggle dance were fitted with tiny radar transponders and released, some of them from an unexpected location, so their actual flight path could be recorded metre by metre.
- Studied in
- Apis mellifera
- Sample size
- individually radar-tracked recruit bees
Recruits flew the vector encoded in the dance — the right direction, for roughly the right distance — and then searched. Bees released from a displaced site flew the same vector from there, arriving in the wrong place, which rules out simple scent-following.
What it means
The authors' reading, and ours. Where they differ, that difference is the point.
How the authors put it
Recruits obtain and use directional and distance information from the dance itself.
How NatureHQ reads it
This is the experiment that ended a thirty-year argument. The displacement condition is the elegant part: if the bees were following an odour they would have arrived at the food, and instead they flew the dance vector into empty ground. It also refines the picture — recruits use the dance to get close, then switch to searching and to scent.
- Radar transponders add weight and may affect flight.
- Sample sizes for individually tracked bees are necessarily small.
- Tested in open, radar-friendly terrain, which is not typical foraging habitat.
Following a bee by radar
When a bee watches a waggle dance, does it actually use the information — or is it just following a scent?
What this study is used for on NatureHQ
One study can inform several subjects. Here is everywhere this one is cited.
Published by: Nature PortfolioPublished in a Nature Portfolio journal.
This reference was resolved automatically against Crossref and OpenAlex on 2026-08-11.
NatureHQ summarises research in its own words and does not reproduce published text. Reviewed 2026-08-09.