Bumblebees Solve Puzzle Without Training, Study Finds

A problem once thought to require the kind of flexible thinking seen mainly in humans and a handful of other animals may not be so exclusive after all.

In a study published in the journal Science in June 2026, researchers in Finland tested whether buff-tailed bumblebees could solve an unfamiliar problem without being shown what to do.

The challenge was far removed from anything the insects would normally encounter in nature.

Researchers placed a sugary artificial flower just beyond the bees’ reach. Nearby was a small ball. To reach the reward, a bee had to move the ball into the correct position and then climb onto it, using the ball as a platform.

The bees were not trained to perform the task, and they were not allowed to watch another bee demonstrate the solution.

Even so, 16 of the 22 bumblebees tested figured it out on their own.

That result caught researchers’ attention because the task required the bees to use an object in a new way to solve a problem they had never encountered before.

The experiment has similarities to famous work conducted more than a century ago by psychologist Wolfgang Köhler. In those experiments, chimpanzees were given problems such as stacking boxes to reach food placed out of reach.

Such tests have often been used to study what researchers call insight or flexible problem-solving — the ability to come up with a new solution rather than simply repeat a learned behavior.

The bumblebee experiment does not mean bees think the way humans or chimpanzees do.

Researchers were careful not to make that claim.

Instead, the finding suggests that surprisingly complex problem-solving may be possible even in animals with extremely small brains.

A bumblebee’s brain is far smaller than the brains of the vertebrates usually associated with flexible thinking. Yet the insects in the experiment were able to manipulate an unfamiliar object and use it as a tool-like platform to reach a reward.

That is what makes the result especially interesting.

Bees are already known for behaviors that require learning and memory. They can navigate large areas, remember the locations of flowers, and communicate information within their colonies.

This experiment, however, presented the bees with something different: an artificial challenge that they would not be expected to encounter during normal foraging.

There was no flower to land on directly and no natural surface that would immediately provide a route to the sugar.

To succeed, the bees had to interact with the movable ball, change its position, and then use the altered environment to reach their goal.

The fact that most of the tested bees eventually found a solution suggests they were capable of adapting their behavior to a new situation rather than relying only on a familiar response.

According to the study’s account, the researchers found the behavior fascinating to observe.

The findings also add to a growing scientific discussion about how much an animal can accomplish with a very small nervous system.

Scientists have traditionally associated more flexible forms of problem-solving with relatively large and complex brains. Studies involving primates, birds and some other vertebrates have helped shape that view.

Experiments with insects are challenging that assumption.

The bumblebee results do not settle questions about how the insects arrive at their solutions or what kind of mental processes are involved.

They do, however, show that brain size alone does not necessarily predict whether an animal can adapt to an unfamiliar problem.

For researchers, that raises broader questions about how intelligence and problem-solving evolved across the animal kingdom.

The study also demonstrates why carefully designed experiments can reveal abilities that are difficult to observe in the wild.

A bee would have little reason in nature to roll a ball beneath a flower and stand on it. By creating an unusual challenge, researchers tested whether the insects could move beyond the behaviors they normally use while feeding.

Most of them did.

Sixteen of the 22 bumblebees successfully reached the reward without training or a demonstration from another bee.

For an animal with a brain smaller than a grass seed, that was enough to make scientists take a closer look at what insects may be capable of learning — and inventing — on their own.