Bumble bees play, according to new research led by Queen Mary University of London published in Animal Behaviour. It is the first time that object play behaviour has been shown in an insect, adding to mounting evidence that bees may experience positive 'feelings'.

 

The team of researchers set up numerous experiments to test their hypothesis, which showed that bumble bees went out of their way to roll wooden balls repeatedly despite there being no apparent incentive for doing so. Three videos of the bees playing are available in the notes to editors below.

 

The study also found that younger bees rolled more balls than older bees, mirroring human behaviour of young children and other juvenile mammals and birds being the most playful, and that male bees rolled them for longer than their female counterparts.

 

The study followed 45 bumble bees in an arena and gave them the options of walking through an unobstructed path to reach a feeding area or deviating from this path into the areas with wooden balls. Individual bees rolled balls between 1 and, impressively, 117 times over the experiment. The repeated behaviour suggested that ball-rolling was rewarding.