Animals9+
The Dancing Honeybee
Honeybees dance to tell their friends where the flowers are!
Why?
When a worker honeybee finds flowers full of nectar, she flies back to the hive and dances on the wax comb in the shape of a figure 8. In the straight middle part, she waggles her body from side to side. This is called the waggle dance.
The direction of that straight line shows where the flowers are compared to the Sun: if she waggles straight up, the flowers are toward the Sun. How long she waggles shows the distance: the longer the waggle, the farther away the flowers.
The other bees follow the dancer to learn the message, then fly straight to the flowers!
Try it
Hide a small toy in the room. Then stand in the middle and show a friend where it is without talking, just like a bee 🐝: point your body toward the toy, and wiggle for one second if it's close or three seconds if it's far. Can your friend find it?
Ask Mum & Dad
If we couldn't talk, how would we tell each other where to find something nice?