Honey Bee Sociometry: Tracking Honey Bee Growth From Birth Until Death by Michael Smith

A lecture given by Michael Smith at the 2018 National Honey Show entitled "Honey Bee Sociometry: Tracking Honey Bee Growth From Birth Until Death" The National Honey Show gratefully acknowledge the Worshipful Company of Wax Chandlers for their support, and Mr. R.Blaxland for their sponsorship.
Sociometry is the description and analysis of the physical and numerical attributes of social insect colonies over their lifetimes. Sociometric data, such as worker number and nest size are essential for understanding how colonies develop, but these data are rarely collected. Even honey bees, the most intensively studied social insect, has never received a broad-scale sociometric study. In this talk, we will follow four colonies throughout their lives, from when the colonies began as swarms in 2012, to when they died in 2014. It’s amazing what you can learn just by watching. I promise this talk will be more than just me reading numbers from an excel spreadsheet.
Michael Smith is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Collective Behaviour at the Max Planck Institute of Ornithology/University of Konstanz. His research focuses on movement patterns in honey bee colonies, and how individual bees detect the developmental state of their group. Michael first began beekeeping in 2005, while attending The United World College of the Atlantic, in St. Donats, Wales. He continued beekeeping during his undergraduate degree at Princeton, while also conducting honey bee research at Wellesley College with Heather Mattila. In 2017, Michael completed his PhD in Tom Seeley’s lab at Cornell University, where he studied growth, development, and reproductive investments in honey bee colonies.

[@BigValleyBeekeepersGuild]

Michael is a great speaker! Very interesting seminar and down to earth as well!

[@piechockidaniel]

Great sense of humor and self-distance, it makes this presentation very interesting and I watched it with a great pleasure.

[@phillipcairns1577]

As a colourblind beekeeper, I really appreciate Michael's choice of colours in his PowerPoint presentation. No pesky reds and greens.

[@carambamboliyt]

Great series of talks, am very impressed.
Micheal: great speaker and very interesting research: much thanks for posting.

[@muratgokirmak8398]

Smart research very interesting..

[@gibsonfarmsltd1764]

What’s in the Fanny pack?

[@hughyhughes8058]

I wonder if anyone in the crowd is still alive.
Looks like a retirement home.

[@Oracle4DeAtlantis]

Dude, you do a whole lot of talking, and you say absolutely nothing to me, which is helpful.