Bees, like humans, can preserve cultural traditions

WHEN IT comes to architectural accomplishments, humans like to think they stand at the top of the pyramid. That is to underestimate the astonishing achievements of social insects: termites raise skyscraping nests and honeybees fashion mesmerisingly geometric combs. The true master builders of the insect world, however, are the hundreds of species of stingless bee, native to the tropics and subtropics, which weave combs of unparalleled variety and intricacy inside hollow tree trunks or other cavities.

Now a group of evolutionary biologists led by Viviana Di Pietro at KU Leuven, in Belgium, reports that, like humans, these tiny-brained creatures are capable of building according to different architectural traditions which are then handed down over generations.