The BEE

Bees transmit information to each other about food sources by a ‘dance’, each movement giving rise to sound impulses which are picked up by tiny hairs on the back of the bee’s head, the orientation of the dance also having significance. They use the Sun in navigation. Besides their use in crop pollination and production of honey and wax, bees (by a measure of contaminants brought back to their hives) can provide an inexpensive and effective monitor of industrial and other pollution of the atmosphere and soil.

The most familiar species is the bumblebee, genus Bombus, which is larger and stronger than the hive bee and so is adapted to fertilize plants in which the pollen and nectar lie deep, as in red clover; they can work in colder weather than the hive bee.

Social bees, apart from the bumblebee and the hive bee, include the stingless South American vulture bee Trigona hypogea, discovered 1982, which is solely carnivorous. Solitary bees include species useful in pollinating orchards in spring, and may make their nests in tunnels under the ground or in hollow plant stems; ‘cuckoo’ bees lay their eggs in the nests of bumblebees, which they closely resemble.

Most bees are pacific unless disturbed, but some species are aggressive. One bee sting may be fatal to a person who is allergic to them, but this is comparatively rare (about 1.5% of the population), and most adults can survive 300-500 stings without treatment. A vaccine treatment against bee stings, which uses concentrated venom, has been developed.

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