Bees Work to Timetables

Following experiments by Michael Boisvert and David Sherry of the University of Western Ontario, it would appear that the humble bumble bee, far from flying about randomly, actually works to a determined, adaptable timetable when going about its daily business based on their understanding of elapsed durations.

In their experiment, a sample of bees were held in a specially designed chamber with feeding devices that only produced nectar at predetermined times. The bees, it would seem, learned exactly when these devices would offer their sweet rewards and not only did they learn to check a device at its particular feeding time, but they also learned how to timetable the feeding times of each device so as to secure as much nectar as they could.

This is a disaster for us mere humans, as it looks like many of us will have to rethink our excuses for not getting into work on time!