Pete, I find it of great interest when scientific findings fly in the face
of my personal experience!  But as you know, I love to challenge myself to
rethink ANYTHING.

I've had the opportunity over my life to compare my sense of smell to that
of other human beings, and it appears that I have a comparatively sensitive
one.  So I feel that I could serve as at least an "average" representative
of a caucasian human living in rural California.  I can thus compare my
sense of smell to my "average" Italian-type honey bees living in a similar
environment (when we are each outdoors).

My first observation is that despite my two nostrils being spread further
apart than the antennae of a honey bee, that the bees exhibit far better
directionality as far as being able to target the source of an odor.

But as the findings posted by Jose point out, our two species may exhibit
greater sensitivity to specific types of odors.  Thus we would expect honey
bees to be far more perceptive of odors relating to the hive, colony
pheromones, flower and pollen scents, fermentation, predators, carbon
dioxide, water, etc.
On the other hand, I may be able to pick the scent of my wife out of a
group of people in a dark room.  And the greater sensitivity of humans to
butyric acid would be expected, due to needing to identify decomposing meat
over fresh.

A simple demonstration is to train oneself to the odor of synthetic Nasanov
pheromone, and then to see how many fanning bees with their Nasonov glands
exposed it takes for you to detect it.  Jose, did Wilson list honey bee
sensitivity to hydrogen sulfide -- something that humans are easily able to
detect in a crowded room?


Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
530 277 4450
ScientificBeekeeping.com

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