Scientists Glue Sensors To 5,000 Bees In a Bid To Better Understand Them
An anonymous reader writes "Scientists at the University of Tasmania working with CSIRO have decided to use the latest sensor technology to help them better understand the behavior of thousands of bees. An RFID sensor has been attached with glue to the back of around 5,000 honey bees in Hobart, Tasmania. In order for that to work, shaving the area of the bee where the sensor would sit was necessary in some cases. Thankfully the bee was asleep during the process, and the sensor is small and light enough that they likely won't notice it is there. With the sensors attached, checkpoints can be setup around the area where the bees travel and pollinate in order to create a three-dimensional map of their movements."
In other news, colony collapse disorder... caused by glue.
A solemn salute to those postgrads that had to stay overnight to glue those 5000 sensors to those bees. I feel your pain, my fellow comrades.
Isn't this the same as some government/business tracking us with our cell phones?
Where all think alike, no one thinks very much.
..to glue tags onto 5000 bees? Workers only live for a few weeks, so unless they have a LOT of bee-gluers hard at work won't their tagged bees start dying before they finish?