热带蜜蜂夜间飞行毫不费力(下)

But do the bees raise their eyes while flying forward in the dark?

但是蜜蜂在黑暗中前行时会抬眼睛看吗?

To find out, the researchers got to messin’ with the Megalopta.

为了找到答案，研究人员开始鼓捣隧蜂。

We placed the Megalopta nest, which is a hollowed-out stick, at a stand in the forest.

我们把隧蜂的巢穴(一个挖空的枯枝)置于林中的一个树丛里。

Sandra Chaib, a University of Lund doctoral student who worked on the project.

隆德大学博士生桑德拉·查伊布参与了这个项目。

On both sides of the nest, we placed two additional mock nest sticks which we had drilled holes in to resemble nests.

在蜂巢的两侧，我们放置了两个额外的假蜂巢，我们在枯枝上面钻了洞，让它看起来像真蜂巢。

Above each nest, they placed a distinctive visual landmark: a single black bar to mark the real nest and a pattern of stripes in different orientations above the fake nests.

他们在每个蜂巢的上方放置了一个独特的视觉地标: 黑色的棍子用来标记真蜂巢，而方向不同的条纹图案用来标记假蜂巢。

The bee was allowed to forage for a few nights to get acquainted with the area.

允许这些蜜蜂觅食几个晚上，以熟悉环境。

And then one night, when the bee was away, Chaib would shuffle the landmarks. And when the busy bee got back…

一天晚上，当蜜蜂离开时，查伊布把地标打乱。当忙碌的蜜蜂回来时……

She immediately entered the nest under the landmark she had learned.

她立刻进入了她熟知的地标下的蜂巢。

Which was one of the fakes.

这是其中一个假蜂巢。

Of course, after a few seconds, she realized her mistake and she came back out again.

当然，几秒钟后，她意识到自己犯了错，又飞了出来。

But after a short flight to get reoriented...she would again make the same mistake.

不过，在经过短暂的飞行重新定向后…...她还会犯同样的错误。

So it seems the bees were sneaking in a last look up before flying in the front door.

似乎蜜蜂是在飞进门前偷偷地抬眼看了一下。

And the same thing happened when the researchers used circles of different sizes to form more canopy-like patterns to mark the entrance to the nests.

当研究人员用大小各异的圆圈制作成类树冠的图案，并用此来标记蜂巢的入口时，同样的事情也发生了。

She took a look at the pattern from underneath, and flew directly into the mock nest.

蜜蜂抬头看了一眼树冠图案，然后直接飞进了假蜂巢。

The results were as clear as day. But, there in the dark, they weren’t exactly easy to see.

结果一清二楚。但是，在黑暗中，这些东西很难看清楚。

Even if we put a hand in front of our face it’s very difficult to see it.

即使我们把一只手放在脸前，也很难看到。

Since it was totally dark, I used night goggles to monitor the nest.

因为天黑透了，我用夜视镜监视蜂巢。

And an infrared camera to film the bees’ comings and goings after sunset and before dawn.

还有一个红外摄像机，用来拍摄蜜蜂在日落后与黎明前的来来去去。

It’s not the most pleasant thing, getting up in the middle of the night to set up the cameras.

半夜起床架摄像机可不是件愉快的事。

On the other hand, the rainforest is the most amazing place at that time. Many animals are the most active at this time.

另一方面，夜晚的热带雨林令人惊叹。许多动物在这个时候最活跃。

Even the humble sweat bees, which will showcase their remarkable skills for anyone who’s prepared to watch.

即使是不起眼的汗蜂，它们也会向任何准备观看的人展示它们非凡的技能。

For Scientific American’s 60-Second Science, I’m Karen Hopkin.

谢谢大家收听科学美国人——60秒科学。我是凯伦·霍普金。