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Date: | Tue, 1 Mar 2011 11:14:48 -0500 |
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Allen asks <How do bees decide what pollen to collect? Do they not sense
it and
make a decision? >
My own observations would indicate that they do. Desperate bees - when
there is little or no available pollen and the colony has a need- may bring
in substances like sawdust.
But, if there's any choice, they seem to be choosy. All of our work says
they've an exquisite olfactory system, in addition to taste and color
recognition. My wife, who specializes in macro-photography reports bees
discriminate 'fresh' blossoms for older - even if there is still pollen
available. She watches and marks stems the day before a blossom is going to open -
the bees head right for the newly opened flowers.
We know bees are choosy about the nutritional value of nectar - lots of
studies have been done. Its not hard to imagine that bees discriminate
sweetness, much as we do. Humans can differentiate high concentrations of
sugar from low. Not so sure we can discriminate the nutritional value of
protein - a steak is different from a plate of beans, etc. But, we do have
taste preferences - some of us prefer meat in our diet. That's a form of
choice, not based on nutritional value. Who's to say bees don't have
preferences?
Finally, its not as readily evident as to how to set up a trial to see if
bees can discriminate nutritional value of pollen as it is with nectar
(where one simply adjusts the sugar concentration and/or type of sugar).
Again, from our own work, given a choice, bees like sucrose better than high
fructose sugar. Whereas some might argue that sucrose is a better diet
nutritionally, its not obvious whether the bees prefer sucrose because its
better nutritionally or just tastes better.
Its probably not odor - unlike wasps, bees seem unable to locate sugar
syrup based on odor alone.
Jerry
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