>        I imagine I am like most beekeepers in enjoying the contented buzz
>of the busy beeyard.  However, I must admit that I also frequently blast the
>truck stereo when I'm working the yards (I like world beat music) and put a
>little tropical rhythm to the movement of my hive tool.  I've never noticed
>any change in the bees, and indeed I had always thought that bees can't
>detect sound.  Before embarassing myself to this group, I thought I better
>check this.  This is the only reference to sound in my copy of "The Hive and
>the Honey Bee" (a well used book but my copy is 25 years old now):
>       "Some insects respond to sound by the vibration of sensory hairs.  We
>have no definite information on the hearing powers of bees, and the bee has
>no known auditory organs."
>>From Roger Morse's "complete guide to Beekeeping" I found this:
>       "So far as is known, honeybees do not use sound as a method of
>communication and no sound receptors are found anywhere on their bodies;
>however, honeybees do detect vibrations and respond to them, presumably
>through organs on their feet. Such vibrations are sometimes referred to in
>the literature as "substrate-born sound".
>       My copy of that book is also very old, and I am wondering whether any
>recent work has found "hearing" in bees.  If bees don't hear, then what is
>the function of piping in emerging queens?  How do they produce that sound?
>The bees may not use sound to communicate amongst themselves, but they
>certainly use it (unwittingly) to communicate with me.  Most beekeepers can
>probably extract some useful information from the "buzz" of the hive.  Maybe
>the experimenters just weren't playing the right music!
>
>Stan Sandler    Milk and Honey Farm
>
 
 
Stan:
        I have heard a very high-pitched sound coming from the queen cages
when we have imported them in the spring.  It has been my idea that this is
coming from the queen, but what the message is, I cannot say.  There is a
distinct odor to the queen, noticeable in the cage, and also in the colony
when opened.  Does anyone know if the pheromones she uses to control the
hive have an odor?  Variations do occur in the intensity and pitch of the
sounds mentioned.  Perhaps there is also variation in quantity, density etc
of the chemicals (?) in the pheromone.  As often before, I wish I knew more.
There are so many interesting, but unanswered, questions.
 
Regards
 
                Eunice W.