Why colour is complex: Evidence that bees perceive neither brightness nor green contrast in colour signal processing

Abstract

Honey bees ( Apis mellifera Linnaeus, 1758) potentially rely on a variety of visual cues when searching for flowers in the environment. Both chromatic and achromatic (brightness) components of flower signals have typically been considered simultaneously to understand how flower colours have evolved. However, it is unclear whether honey bees actually use brightness information in their colour perception. We investigated whether free-flying honey bees can process brightness cues in achromatic stimuli when presented at a large visual angle of 28° to ensure colour processing. We found that green contrast (modulation of the green receptor against the background) and brightness contrast (modulation of all three receptors against the background) did not have a significant effect on the proportion of correct choices made by bees, indicating that they did not appear to use brightness cues in a colour processing context. Our findings also reveal that, even at a small visual angle, honeybees do not reliably process single targets solely based on achromatic information, at least considering values up to 60% modulation of brightness. We discuss these findings in relation to proposed models of bee colour processing. Therefore, caution should be taken when interpreting elemental components of complex flower colours as perceived by different animals.