Researchers on a leisure-time hiking trip have discovered how honeybees pilfer pollen from their bumblebee peers.
Milan-based experts on the environment Tiziano Londei and Giuliana Marzi went to Monte Antola, a peak in the Ligurian Apennines, northern Italy, in the summer of 2019.
They saw by accident how western honeybees (Apis mellifera) continuously nicked pollen, which is essential nutrition for insects, from red-tailed bumblebees (Bombus lapidarius).
While honeybees struggle to pick up pollen from woolly thistles, the powdery substance gets stuck on bumblebees’ hairy bodies, Science News reports.
Tiziano and Giuliana said: “We observed this behaviour, previously studied only in North America and as a rare occurrence, on each of the three visits, one per year, we made to the same site in Italy.”
Red-tailed bumblebees appear in summer. They can be found all over Europe. The social insects do not shy away from foraging for nectar and pollen at high altitudes.
