Slide 24 of 31

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Slide 24 of 31

Notes:

Here’s the distribution of numbers of flowers available per raceme from the same fields at the same time as the bees were being followed. There are many more flowers per raceme in bloom early in the season than late in the season. Bees clearly don’t visit all of the flowers available on racemes. A similar change in distribution of numbers of flowers per raceme when standing crop was high vs. low was seen in commercial fields. (see slide show 3) We were able to generate the distribution of flowers visited by bees late in the season (slide 21), by superimposing the 57% movement rule on the late season distribution of flowers per raceme. Few racemes have more than three flowers open. So, stay on the raceme 43% of the time, but if there are no more flowers in bloom, the bee has to leave.