This discussion is interesting because I'm part of a search and rescue team using dogs for scent detection. As such, I've been learning a bit about scent detection. Navigating using scent would be really, really difficult for a honey bee. In some situations it would be possible but I have a hard time imagining honey bees would use it consistently.
I say this because a search dog requires one or two years of training to understand how to follow a scent to a source. Even very experienced dogs are often perplexed at the way a scent is behaving. Only the smartest dogs with the best noses can be good scent detection dogs and while they have innate abilities, much of how they follow scent is learned through experience.
For example, in calm weather, scent may travel uphill in the morning, downhill in the evening, and rise straight up during the day. Scent will move from a shady forest out into a sunny clearing. Coniferous trees trap scent; add a wind and a slope to a loose stand of coniferous trees and dogs do circles in confusion. Tall objects, such as buildings or forest edges, will trap scent. Add a wind and the scent may be pushed up over the object and dropped down many yards away.
Scent can pool, eddy, loop, chimney, hit thermoclines, loft, fan, and fumigate depending on topographic features, wind, temperature, humidity, and cloud cover.
I don't doubt honey bees can detect scents and behave in ways that alert us to, for example, explosives, but to consistently navigate based on scent is just unrealistic given the complexities of how scent dynamically interacts with the environment. If the best scent detection dogs take years of training and learning to reliably follow a scent, I'm not convinced a three week old honey bee can possess the ability to navigate using scent. I don't know how their brains could figure out how to compensate for variable environmental conditions when they're learning is inherently limited by their lifespan.
...Although maybe they don't compensate very well? Maybe there's a reason why foragers tend to leave their nests very early in the morning and prefer warm, calm, clear days? Those are the simplest times and conditions for scent tracking. Scent tracking on a windy, gusty, pre-storm day is terribly confusing.
Now I'm doubting myself! In any case, I just wanted to point out the complexities of scent navigation. It's not just as simple as upwind/downwind. And the keenness of one's olfaction is a benefit but one requires a lot of other brain power to be able to successful navigate based on scent.
Tracey
Alberta, Canada
***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html
|