Crocus thomasii fragrance

arnold trachtenberg arnold@nj.rr.com
Mon, 07 Nov 2005 08:08:33 PST
I stand corrected.

Arnold


Byline: Rebecca Jones Denver Rocky Mountain News Staff Writer
 

Do bees smell? When you wear perfume, they congregate around you. - 
Daniel Garcia, Denver
Bees, like many insects, have a remarkable sense of smell, says 
University of Wyoming entomologist Jim Wangberg. ``They can detect many, 
many odors that are not detectable to humans,'' he says. ``And there are 
certain kinds of odors they are best adapted to detect, like the odor of 
their food source - flowers, pollen and nectar.'' You'll forgive a bee 
that gets confused by Jungle Gardenia.
Bees have no noses, by the way. They smell through antennae.
In addition to smelling flowers, bees are good at detecting each other's 
odor, Wangberg says. ``They recognize hivemates,'' he says. ``If you 
don't belong to the hive, you won't be allowed in. And in the pitch 
blackness of a hive, where vision can play no role, the bees communicate 
all kinds of things through odors.''
 


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