
The Huge, Bee-Decapitating Hornet That Can’t Survive Group Hugs - davidhcs
http://www.wired.com/2016/02/absurd-creature-of-the-week-the-huge-bee-decapitating-that-hornet-cant-survive-group-hugs/
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headgasket
I WANT TO SAY: thanks wired for the new anti-adblock campaign. You just saved
me 10 minutes of my life reading about bee beheading hornets. Now back to
programming.

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CaptSpify
Interesting. I didn't see anything like that. Maybe noscript = win?

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egeozcan
If you're blocking their cookies, or blocking scripts (because they increment
read articles count with js for some reason) then you don't feel a thing
indeed. Also, it doesn't seem to detect DNS based blocking.

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otoburb
"[The European honey bee] hasn’t stumbled upon the swarm countermeasure, so
the hornet scout inevitably marks a European bee nest and returns with its
friends."

Given how devastatingly effective these hornets are, the honey bee swarming
behaviour seems to be a completely "over-the-top" reaction that thankfully
works for them, although the bees (surely?) have no idea why.

Have any beekeepers been successful teaching European (or any other type of)
honey bees new, complex behaviours? If they have, how do newly acquired
behavrioual patterns spread beyond the initial target hive?

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WoodenChair
How do you go about "teaching European honey bees new, complex behaviors"?

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otoburb
That's exactly what I'm wondering - whether there have been any instances of
deliberate human-caused epigenetic changes in bees. In light of @ansible's
sister comment that worker bees only live a few months, teaching or learning
any new behaviour, let alone one as complex as recognizing and swarming an
intruder to death, seems to be even more unlikely.

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Qworg
Bees are a eusocial organism. While individual bees are dumb/unable to
understand their actions, as a whole, bees are remarkably intelligent.

Bees already swarm and kill intruders, but simply lack the understanding of
how to bake the wasps. I think a cross breeding program may take care of that
issue - but hybridization can bring other problems (see African bees mixing
with European).

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erikb
I just got "ad walled" by wired, putting a huge paywall like thing in front of
the text talking about ad blockers. Anybody seen things like that? Certainly
won't click the next wired link.

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arijun
I think it's their prerogative to say "either get served ads, become a paying
member, or leave." I imagine they wont mourn the loss of someone who would
have likely not brought them revenue in any form, ever.

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Symmetry
Part of the reason I use Addblock rather than another plugin is that I agree
with their whole "acceptable adds" idea and I'm perfectly happy with adds if
they aren't too annoying. But I wonder how many companies actually use that
program?

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pilom
Same story in comic form:
[http://theoatmeal.com/comics/bees_vs_hornets](http://theoatmeal.com/comics/bees_vs_hornets)

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S_A_P
There is a Nat Geo special called "Hornets from Hell" that shows video of the
honey bee hug. It also gives some nightmare inducing close up footage of these
things.

Signed a wasp phobic person

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2bluesc
National Geo video on YT on same topic:
[https://youtu.be/2P7Q1ncgcoY](https://youtu.be/2P7Q1ncgcoY)

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crikli
Sorta apropos: if you have not read The Bees give it a look, even if you're
not one for fiction. This "group hug" is part of a key scene and other bee
social behaviors make for a unique and fascinating novel.
[http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FJ3CM7M](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FJ3CM7M)

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dovdov
Can we just drop wired.com indefinitely?

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jpl56
people who subscribe to the site would complain. Why not create a per-user
"exclude list"? If I don't want to see posts hosted on Wired.com, I just add
the domain in this list...

