Honeybee flight: A novel 'streamlining' response

Abstract

Animals that move rapidly through the air can save considerable energy by reducing the drag that they need to overcome during flight. We describe a novel 'streamlining' response in tethered, flying honeybees in which the abdomen is held in a raised position when the visual system is exposed to a pattern of image motion that is characteristic of forward flight. This visually evoked response, which can be elicited without exposing the insect to any airflow, presumably serves to reduce the aerodynamic drag that would otherwise be produced by the abdomen during real flight. The response is critically dependent on the presence of appropriate image motion everywhere within the large field of view of the insect. Thus, our results also underscore the importance of using panoramic stimulation for the study of visually guided flight in insects, and reveal the relative importance of various regions of the visual field in assessing the speed of flight through the environment.