• With photographs by Helga R. Heilmann
• Publisher: Springer Spektrum
• Hardcover, 273 pages

Blurb

New insights into the fascinating world of honey bees

Whether as suppliers of honey and wax, as masters of social organization in a highly ordered state system or as architects of impressively regular honeycomb constructions - honeybees have always fascinated humans. And thanks to their enormous pollination service for cultivated plants, they are simply indispensable to us. Scientists who are on the trail of the secrets of these insects are unraveling the "honey bee phenomenon" step by step - and are constantly coming across new surprises. This book allows the reader to share in the current state of knowledge and the often groundbreaking findings that have been made in recent years - not least by Jürgen Tautz's working group in Würzburg. At the same time, the numerous previously largely unpublished photographs by photographer Helga R. Heilmann provide the viewer with a new visual image of these evolutionarily so successful organisms. "The bee colony is like a magic fountain; the more you draw from it, the richer it flows", Karl von Frisch, the old master of honey bee research, once aptly said. Let yourself be whisked away to this magic fountain!