Sound Communication in Honeybees

QUEEN PIPING includes "quacking" and "tooting." A queen in her cell produces quacking (left), a series of short pulses with emphasis on several harmonics. Once free in the hive a queen produces tooting (right), which begins with a long wail, has a somewhat higher fundamental frequency and usually emphasizes frequencies not simultaneously emphasized by quacking queens.

TOOTING was simulated (upper tracing) and played to a caged queen via a vibrator touching the hive (A). It elicited from the queen a response that was picked up by a microphone (B) and
analyzed as quacking (lower tracing). When the tooting vibrator was suspended above the queen (C), there was no response, indicating that the queen perceived sound via the hive structure.