Bees — What’s with the Buzz?

10 April 2014

Ms. Bee, why do you buzz?

Reason #1: Mechanics

Bees can’t help it.  When the bee flaps its small wings with amazing speed, it creates a gust of wind.  Well, actually, it creates a lot of short, strong gusts of wind.  These small gusts are so sudden and definite, that we hear it as a buzz. Bee’s aren’t the only insect that buzzes. Flies buzz and so do many other flying insects.  But the bee takes a prize for having a particularly loud buzz.

Reason #2: Pollination

Some bees buzz even when they’re not flying. Bumblebees are known for their characteristically loud buzz.  However, unlike hive-dwelling honeybees, bumblebees don’t just buzz when they’re flying.  They can, and do, produce that same buzz without moving their wings.  And it is just the vibration from this flightless buzz that makes the bumblebee a uniquely valuable pollinator of certain crops.

After landing on a blossom, the large bumblebee grabs the blossom and holds it tightly.  While maintaining this tight grip, it strongly vibrates while remaining stationary.  Nothing less than the bumblebee’s strong vibration will assure pollination by shaking loose sufficient quantities of the thick pollen produced by certain species of plants.  No other bee could do this job as consistently or successfully.

Bumbles are specially suited to pollinate a variety of cash crops including tomatoes, cranberries, almonds, apples, zucchinis, avocados, and plums.  Their unique style of pollination accounts for about 3 billion dollars in produce each year.

Reason #3: Electronic Communication

Third, recent speculation suggests that bees may buzz to enhance their electronic communication. Yes, electronic communication ! Honeybees communicate with each other through a variety of dances. One of the bees’ “steps” is the waggle dance. When a single bee discovers an area rich in pollen and honey, the bee returns to the hive and does the waggle dance. The bee’s dance-moves inform the other bees of the location of the blooms that will provide the most food.

We always thought it was the waggle dancer’s “moves” that did the talking.  But, now, we’re not so sure.  Researchers discovered that honeybees generate and pick up an electrical charge when they fly.  The charge is so strong that the flying honeybee produces an electrical field.  In fact, the waggle-dancing bee produces an electrical field so strong that it has been known to move the antennae of the bees “in the audience.”

What does all this have to do with buzzing?  Well, guess what makes the dancing bee’s electrical field even stronger?  Sound.  What kind of sound?  The sound of buzzing.  So, the buzz of the honeybee may be more than just the sound its wings happen to make when they flap.  That buzz may be an electronic amplifier that works like a loud speaker to broadcast its message louder and farther.

“Reason #3” was supposed to be end of the list.  But as I was writing, I carelessly imagined the sound of a swarm of bees . . . buzzing.  And, to my surprise, that sound, even in my imagination, scared me a little.  I felt a “knee-jerk” reaction.  Alarm.  I wanted to get to a safe distance – fast!   So, I’ve added another possible reason why bees buzz . . .

Reason #4: A Warning 

Could the bee’s buzz be a warning?  Does the buzz of a swarm of bees scare-off persons or animals that might, otherwise, interfere with the bees’ work gathering honey and pollen.  And when the bees are “at home,” could the sound of their buzzing also warn off potential predators or honey robbers that might disturb the bees’ hive? 

My own alarm at even the imagined sound of swarm of buzzing bees reminded me of something.   I remembered a story about a movie.

It was rumored that the sound of a swarm of agitated bees was inserted into the soundtrack of the 1973 horror film, The Exorcist.  As the story goes, to keep audience tensions high during relatively quiet scenes, director William Friedkin had Ron Nagle recorded and, then, altered the sound of a swarm of angry bees.  Finally, the sound was carefully “blended” into the film’s final soundtrack.

No one actually heard the sound of the buzzing swarm because no one was supposed to hear it. The recording of the agitated bees was intentionally introduced at a subliminal level of volume.  That is, the recording was played at a volume too low to be consciously heard.  But the volume was sufficient to allow viewers (and listeners) to unconsciously “hear” the buzzing swarm and react with their own fear and agitation.

This classic tale from film history assumes that the sound of the buzzing of a swarm of angry bees is terrifying to human beings.  So, maybe the bees’ buzz has yet another purpose:  It keeps meddlers at a distance while the bees do their work.

See: The Sound of Silence for more on the cinematic tale of the subliminal sound of “the swarm of bees.”

M Grossmann of Hazelwood, Missouri & Belleville, Illinois

10 April 2014

About the Author

What Einstein Didn’t Say About Bees

10 April 2014

In 1994, a quote attributed to Albert Einstein appeared in popular circulation:

“If the bee disappears from the surface of the earth, man would have no more than four years to live..”

Einstein didn’t say that.

If the great scientist ever said anything about bees, publicly, he was probably quoting someone else. Maybe the statement, above, was made by whoever circulated the quote in 1994 and, then, “creatively” attributed it to Einstein.  Then, again, maybe the quote had been around for a while, but came from another source – someone other than Einstein.

But, then, who said it?

The prize for the closest match from a known source goes to Belgian writer Maurice Maeterlinck who said in his 1901 book, “The Life of the Bee”:

“[You’ve seen the bee] to whom we probably owe most of our flowers and fruits (for it is actually estimated that more than a hundred thousand varieties of plants would disappear if the bees did not visit them), and possibly even our civilization, for in these mysteries all things intertwine.”

While not packing quite the punch of the modern (apocryphal) Einstein quote, Maeterlinck is perhaps the oldest commentator to link the disappearance of bees with a dire result for humanity.

While there’s no record of Einstein ever saying anything about bees, there is a short history of bee quotations attributed to him.

“The Canadian Bee Journal” included a bee quotation attributed to Einstein, in 1941, but no one has ever been able to actually link the quote to Einstein. Even the writer says that he or she is quoting from memory:

“Remove the bee from the earth and at the same stroke you remove at least one hundred thousand plants that will not survive.”

Not until 1966, did “The Irish Beekeeper” attribute a bee quotation to Einstein that mentioned the end of humanity:

“Professor Einstein, the learned scientist, once calculated that if all bees disappeared off the earth, four years later all humans would also have disappeared.”

But no one can find any source of, or reference to, the quotation above. “The Irish Beekeeper” attributed the quote to a 1965 issue of a French periodical, Abeilles et fleurs.   Unfortunately, despite a thorough search of that periodical’s contents, no such quote, attributed to Einstein or anyone else, could be found.

In his 1992 book, The Diversity of Life, Biologist Edward O. Wilson wrote:

“[I]f all [the bees] were to disappear, humanity probably could not last more than a few months.”

But this is, certainly, Wilson’s statement and not anyone else’s.

Finally, during a 1994 demonstration by beekeepers in Brussels, members of the National Union of French Apiculture handed out pamphlets attributing the following quotation to Albert Einstein:

“If the bee disappears from the surface of the earth, man would have no more than four years to live. No more bees, no more pollination … no more men!”

Again, Al never said that.  And we may never know who did.

M Grossmann of Hazelwood, Missouri & Belleville, Illinois

10 April 2014

About the Author

Electric Bees

13 February 2014

Nature seems like magic.  We marvel at nature’s mysteries.  How do the ants communicate and maintain their coordinated and orderly activities?  And the honeybees?  How do bees communicate with each other?  How do they identify different types of flowers?  Then, how do they select the flowers with honey?

It all seems like magic.

But, so does a stage magician’s mind-reading act. The magician’s assistant mingles with members of the audience who tell the assistant secrets or show the assistant secret objects. Though too far away to see or hear anything, the magician seems to guess the secret or the name of the hidden object -- instantly.

It all seems like magic, but it isn’t.

The magician can actually hear the conversation between the assistant and the audience members.  How?  The assistant is wearing a hidden microphone and transmitter.  In other words, the assistant is “wired for sound” or “wearing a wire.”

Now, some research suggests that honeybees, among themselves, and together with the help and support of the flowers, have been fooling us for years.  They may have fooled us into believing that they had some kind of magical instinct.  But, all along, they’ve just been “wearing a wire.”

The bee’s chief form communication is the waggle dance.  The waggle dancing bee informs its audience if, and when, it has found a rich area full of flowers loaded with honey.  And the dance is also an effort to persuade the rest of the bees to go after the newly discovered honey.

At least that’s what we always thought was going on. 

But, now, we’ve found out something we didn’t know before.  Honeybees generate and pick up an electrical charge when they fly.  The charge is so strong that the flying honeybee is surrounded by an electrical field.  When a bee “talks” to other bees, by dancing, it can create an electrical field powerful enough to move the antenna of the other bees “in the audience.”  The dancing bee’s electrical field seems to have a stronger effect when it is combined with sound.  What sort of sound?   You guessed it.   A sound like . . . buzzing.

All this time, scientists have been carefully observing the waggle dancers’ “steps” (choreography).   But the dancing bee may just be talking to the audience electrically — sort of like the bee version of a walkie-talkie.  Maybe, bees don’t even need to waggle dance when they “talk.”  Maybe, they just like to waggle when they talk on what is their version of an iPhone.

As if that wasn’t enough of a “buzz-kill” to the magical mystery of the honeybee’s daily activities, it turns out that the flowers are “in on the act” as well.  Researchers at the University of Bristol found that, like bees, flowers also have electrical fields.  And guess what?  The flowers’ electrical fields seem to communicate information to bumblebees.

Like an air traffic controller’s computer screen, a flower’s electrical field seems to tell the bee everything – flower type, volume of pollen, time of last bee visit, etc.  In fact, the flowers’ “transmissions” tell the bees so much, so quickly, that the bee’s daily activities are transformed from a maze of complexity into a “no-brainer.”   This may all help to explain the bee’s amazing social organization.  Since honey-gathering is so easy with all this electronic “ground support,” the bees can afford to spend their abundant spare time organizing the hive.  What else do they have to do?

So, in the end, we may find that yet another one of nature’s magical veils has fallen away.  In the past, researchers spent years studying the bees’ elaborate dance-moves and the flowers’ colors, shapes, and odor.   But the dances, decorations, and perfumes may turn out to have been just a distraction -- “smoke and mirrors” – concealing nature’s version of “on board computers” that handle everything.

Bee Buzz Creates Electric Field That Helps Insects Communicate

M Grossmann of Hazelwood, Missouri & Belleville, Illinois

13 February 2014

About the Author

Bees Seek New Careers – Tired of Sweat-Shop Apiaries and CCD?

13 February 2014

The fate of bees, generally, is a matter of great concern these days.  Bee populations throughout the world, and particularly in the United States and Europe, are dropping rapidly and mysteriously.  Without the bees’ unique service as pollinators, the value of yearly agriculture output would drop by billions of dollars.  Without bees, our food supply would plummet and a good portion of the people on earth would begin to starve – quickly.

The problem has a name CCD, Colony Collapse Disorder, but no one is sure what it is.  The best guess is that bees are weakened by a variety of factors until their immune systems collapse.  Then, they contract, and are killed, by an unrelated disease, leaving researchers to trace back through the maze to the root cause or causes.

But let’s look at the world from the bee’s perspective.  What is it like to live a bee’s life?  Right now, a terrible plague, CCD, is hanging over bee populations all over the world.  And what would the surviving bees say, if asked about their daily life?

Well, I think it would go something like this. 

Interviewer: What is it like to work as a pollinator, Ms. Bee? 

Bee: Work!  We aren’t worker-bees anymore!  We’re slaves being worked to death.


Interviewer: I don’t understand.  Don’t you live outdoors -- in nature?  Buzzing and working as you have for thousands of years?

Bee: Nature!?  Natural life!?  Not even close!  First, we’re fed chemicals to make us more active during pollination season.  It’s like the stuff they give to athletes before a big competition.  We don’t recover until about 3 months after the pollination season is over.

And, during pollination season, we’re trucked hundreds of miles on bumpy roads 24-hours a day so we can’t sleep.  And we don’t get any food.  They’re afraid we won’t be aggressive enough pollinators unless were starving.

Interviewer: Yes, but when you get to the fields, you get to chow down . . . ?

Bee: What?!  They release twice as many bees into those fields as are needed to pollinate the available blossoms.  That’s so they can make sure every blossom gets pollinated.  So, most of us get hardly anything to eat.  And, we were starving already.

Interviewer: But, then, they feed you.

Bee: No.  Then, they starve us for another day — so we’ll be “aggressive” about gathering honey.  Remember?    No wonder we’re dropping like flies.  Like I said, it takes months for us to recover after the big pollination season.  The only time we get to eat is when we’re resting off-season.  After a few years of this . . .  Let’s just say I wouldn’t cry if I never saw a blossom again.

[Nervously, the interviewer pauses – afraid to bring up the next subject.]

Interviewer: [cautiously] I want to ask you about . . . pesticides.

Bee: Pesticides! Don’t even get me started about pesticides!

A bee’s life?  If I had these working conditions, I’d look for a new career.  I’m sure many honeybees fall victim to CCD yearly.  But the more I hear about the honeybees’ life in the hive, the more I wonder if some are sneaking away to alternative careers to escape the sweatshop conditions of employment as a “pollinator.”  Honeybee’s have something going for them.  After thousands of years of smelling flowers, they’ve got good noses . . . .

TRAIN FAST FOR A NEW CAREER IN HEALTHCARE: DIAGNOSTICS

Observation of Honeybee Behavior in Glass Structure Can Identify Diseases

I can imagine honeybees buzzing around windows and ducking into homes and libraries to catch a look at the internet hoping to see one of those ads, “A Career in Health Care – Train in less than . . . 10 minutes?!”  Yes, learn advanced medical diagnostics, for bees, in less than 10 minutes. What can you expect to learn to diagnose?

Tuberculosis, lung, skin and pancreatic cancer.

However, there is one catch.  You must be a honeybee, Apis mellifera! Other species need not apply.  What’s so special about these bees?  They have an unbelievably acute sense of smell.  They can detect airborne molecules in the parts-per-trillion range.  What does that mean?  Well, let’s just say this puts “sniffer dogs” to shame.

But what does smell have to do with diagnosing diseases?  Do people with certain diseases smell?  No!  But their breath carries an odor that indicates the presence of certain diseases.  Technically called “biomarkers,” distinct chemical odors are associated with specific diseases.  Odors that honeybees can detect.

A bee might ask, “What sort of working conditions?”

The bees work in a glass structure designed by Susana Soares of Portugal.  When the patient exhales into that same glass structure, the bees must fly into a smaller chamber (within the larger glass chamber) if they smell disease.

Glass Structure Designed by Susana Soares Uses Bees to Diagnose Certain Diseases

The next question the bee might ask, “What about the training?”

The training takes about 10 minutes.  The bees are exposed to a biomarker odor associated with a particular disease.  With each exposure they are fed a solution of water and sugar until they associate the odor with the reward.

“Reward, huh?” muses the honeybee applicant.  “What sort of benefits can I expect?”  “Are these job secure?”

The answer.  The 10 minute training will last for life.  Of course, your employer has to keep your skills sharp by rewarding you with water and sugar repeatedly.

“So,” the bee muses, “I only have to train once, and I’ll get rewarded almost constantly with water and sugar?”  (pause)  “Sweet!”

And everyone’s wondering why bees leave their hives and don’t come back.

Designer Trains Bees To Detect Some Cancers

Honey bees can be trained to detect cancer “in ten minutes”

TRAIN FOR A CAREER IN LAW ENFORCEMENT: THE WAR ON DRUGS

The DEA may be planning to use bees for security-related activities. “Security-related activities?”  Yes, bees may be rapidly replacing those clumsy flea-bitten beasts on four legs — drug-sniffing dogs.  Remember a bee’s nose put’s the canine sniffer to shame. A small hive of honeybees is easier to carry and care for than those hounds with their endless vaccinations, flea powder, and licensing requirements.

What working conditions can the bees expect? The same cushy conditions as those in medical diagnostics: Job security with constant rewards in the form of food – water and sugar.  But, instead of a glass jar, these bees work in a box. What do they do in the box. The same thing they did in the jar. It’s all about the bee’s amazing sense of smell.

Again, remember those noses. The bees don’t even have to leave home, but live in a mobile home or, rather, a box.  When air is blown through their “buzz box,” their responsive behavior alerts officers to the presence of drugs.

The box works on the same principle as the glass jar in medical diagnostics. The bees are trained to recognize the smell of a particular drug through rewards. When the air blows through the box, if the smell of contraband is detected, the bees react. But the buzz box is an especially easy gig – the bees don’t even have to fly. All they have to do is stick their tongues out. The users will recognize this, not as a sign of disrespect, but as preparation for meal as the bees associate the smell of drugs with a reward.

As far back as 2006, researchers at the Rothamsted Research Centre in Hertfordshire, UK were testing the first prototype of the buzz box.  It is being manufactured and marketed by Inscentinel a related company. Inscentinel’s General Manager, Rachael Carson, says that this technology could be used to detect more than drugs and might even be used to monitor food quality.

Rothamsted Research Centre

Inscentinel

But with research also emphasizing security-related applications, such as the detection of TNT, Semtex, gunpowder and other explosives, another related career will soon be open to our job-seeking honeybees.

SNIFFER BEES NEW FLYING SQUAD IN WAR AGAINST TERROR

TRAIN FOR A CAREER IN COUNTER TERRORISM

Remember the sign that used to say, “We’re looking for a few good dogs.” Well, the word “dogs” has been crossed out and “bees” written-in above it.

The same buzz box in which bees detect the scent of drugs, works just as well with the scent of explosives. This opens a wide range of civilian and military jobs to our career-switching bees. The “B Teams” (bee teams) in the buzz boxes are building an impressive test record detecting explosives hidden in shipments passing through busy cargo airports.

The big losers here are the “former drug-sniffing” dogs. There may be a canine unemployment issue as man’s best friend starts pounding the pavement looking for work after losing out to the new, cheaper, and less care-intensive honeybee.

A FEW GOOD BEES NEEDED FOR HUMANITARIAN DE-MINING.

American researchers have, and are, experimented with mine-searching bees as part of combat landmine clearance. However, landmines can remain hidden in the ground long after hostilities have ended. During the peace, after war, the job of finding and removing “abandoned” landmines is called “humanitarian de-mining.”

Humanitarian De-Mining

Croatian researchers heard about the honeybee’s amazing nose and are, now, training bees to find unexploded landmines. About 750 square kilometers (466 square miles) of Croatia and the Balkans may still be filled with mines from the Balkan wars in the 1990’s.

Nikola Kezic, a professor at Zagreb University and an expert on the behavior of honeybees, has proposed an experiment: Bees have an almost perfect sense of smell – one that can quickly detect the scent of explosives. Can the insect be trained through food rewards to detect the smell of TNT?  TNT is the most frequent explosive used in the landmines.

The problem is that the smell of TNT evaporates very quickly. Too quickly for dogs or rats to detect. (Yes, rats have been used in landmine detection.) However, neither of these animals have a nose anywhere near as sensitive as that of the honeybee.

For these experiments, the bees will be trained by mixing a small quantity of TNT in with food — water and sugar. After the bees learn to associate the smell of TNT with food, they will be released into a field in which small quantities of TNT have been placed in various locations. If they can locate the TNT in the field, the bees should be able to smell the traces of TNT from a buried land mine. The Croatian researchers are optimistic about the early test results.

And speaking of “humanitarian” applications, let’s not forget the welfare or our dogs (and, apparently, even our rats). This is one career that the dogs and rats will be happy to leave behind. Although dogs can, sometimes, sniff out land mines, they are rather heavy animals. Weight on the surface of the ground — above a landmine — doesn’t promise anything good for the locating canine. If a particular dog is successful in locating landmines, it tends to enjoy a very short career.

In contrast, the bees remain airborne, and can not only detect TNT, but live to sniff another day.

HONEYBEES TRAINED IN CROATIA TO FIND LAND MINES

At least one bee researcher expressed dismay with all of these new careers for the honeybee. The fear is that putting honeybees in these unfamiliar boxes and jars could cause stress that would affect the insect’s performance.  However, when you review the “unnatural” life of the modern “pollinating” honeybee, nothing about any of these new careers could be remotely stressful. So far, the bees seem to thoroughly enjoy the light work schedule and frequent rewards.

I wouldn’t be surprised if, someday soon, the almond orchards of California will have a serious honeybee shortage. CCD? Sure. Bees are dying in record numbers. But, just maybe, more than a few are escaping to alternative careers with comfortable working conditions, generous benefits, and long term security. Maybe even bees know a “better deal” when they find it . . . or smell it.

Mark Grossmann of Hazelwood, Missouri & Belleville, Illinois

13 February 2014

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