Bees navigate by trial and error, getting closer and closer to the best routes. Somebody should point out that such methods are hard, NP hard, since this is probably the same problem as the travelling salesman.
Do they make a beeline for nectar?
Ley lines were forged by men, but it is my guess that they did not just work out a route by some mysterious method. They simply walked, and noticed, the next time they walked that route if a small deviation made the route shorter. This was obvious, since it took less time to get from the starting point to the final destination.
Lars Chittka at Queen Mary, University of London.
