DOI: 10.5061/dryad.qbzkh18tj
title: Data from: Follow the flower: Approach-flight behaviour of bumblebees landing on a moving target

description: While landing on flowers, pollinating insects often have to deal with
 flower movement caused by wind. Here, we determined the landing
 performance of bumblebees on a moving artificial flower, and how they use
 their visual-motor system to control their landings. To do this, we built
 an experimental setup containing a physical model of a flower, moving
 sideways using sinusoidal kinematics at various oscillation frequencies
 (up to 0.65 Hz, at constant amplitude of 5 cm). We filmed the landings of
 Bombus terrestris bumblebees on this moving flower model and extracted the
 flight kinematics and trajectories using deep neural network-based
 videography tracking. The bumblebees were capable of compensating for the
 detrimental effects of flower movement on landing performance for flower
 frequencies up to 0.53 Hz. Only at our maximum frequency of 0.65 Hz, the
 percentage of successful landings decreased, but landing accuracy and
 duration were not affected. To successfully land on the moving flower, the
 bumblebees gradually slowed down, aimed towards the middle of the flower
 and aligned with its movement. Our results indicated that bumblebees use
 modular visual-motor control feedback to do this: (1) they slow down by
 maintaining an approximately constant average optic expansion of the
 approaching flower image; (2) they aim towards the flower by keeping the
 flower in the middle of their view;  (3) they align to the flower
 movement by minimizing the sideways optic flow of the moving flower image.
 Our findings increase our understanding of how flying insects land on
 flowers moved by wind.
description: # Data from: Follow the flower: Approach-flight behaviour of bumblebees
 landing on a moving target Flight kinematics data of bumblebees landing on
 an artificial flower moving vertically at five different movement
 frequencies (0, 0.03 Hz, 0.24 Hz, 0.53 Hz, and 0.65 Hz). The dataset
 contains 728 successful landing manoeuvres of bumblebees from 2 hives. It
 includes the temporal dynamics of the position, velocity, and acceleration
 of the bumblebees and the flower during the approach flight of the
 bumblebees. NaN- not a number. The bumblebee_data folder (containing 30
 csv files) contains the x and y position of the bees, the vx and vy
 velocity of the bees, and the ax and ay acceleration of the bees in
 separate csv files. Position, velocity, and acceleration of the middle,
 left, right, head, and tail of the bumblebees are included. Each csv file
 inside this folder contains 728 columns and 300 rows, each column
 representing a separate landing trajectory over time. The trajectories are
 aligned with t=0 at the moment of touchdown, at row number 300. The flower
 kinematics at the corresponding times and trajectory numbers are included
 in the flower_data folder (containing 18 csv files). It contains the x and
 y position, the vx and vy velocity, and the ax and ay acceleration of the
 middle, left, and right of the artificial flower. The time_s.csv file
 shows the time relative to the moment of touchdown during the approach
 flights of the bumblebees. Flower movement frequency during each
 trajectory is given in flower_frequency.csv. It includes frequency 0, 1,
 2, 3, and 4, with: 0 = 0 Hz 1 = 0.03 Hz 2 = 0.24 Hz 3 = 0.53 Hz 4 = 0.65
 Hz Day number relative to the moment the experiment started is given by
 day_number.csv. The experiments were performed using two different hives.
 Hive number is given in the file hive_number.csv.