Bees get a buzz out of Spanish artist Picasso

PUBLISHED: November 16, 2012 at 2:00 pm  •  LAST EDITED: November 14, 2012 at 5:40 pm
Lead2, National News  •  1 Comments

• Honey bees have been the subject of extensive studies

SCIENTISTS have discovered honeybees are able to recognise a painting by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso.

The study, which aimed to discover how the insect searches for food, found a highly developed capacity for processing visual information.

The tests began by teaching bees to associate either an abstract Picasso or impressionistic Monet piece with a sugary reward, which was placed behind one of the paintings for each experiment.

The bees could not tell which painting contained the food, meaning they had to choose the right one to get to the sugar.

Dr Nigel Raine, an animal behaviour expert at the University of London, said: “This helps us understand how bees learn about differences in the appearance of flowers.”

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