On Mon, 28 Oct 1996, Jerry J Bromenshenk wrote:
 
> Hi
>
> Because we now have the capability to continuously measure bee flight in
> and out of 21 hives located in Maryland, we are in the process of
> examining the effects of a wide array of external stressors on honey bee
> behavior.
>
> We looked at smoke.  Two small (and I mean really small) puffs of smoke at
> the entrance, wait 2 minutes, puff twice more and then watch the results.
>
> Because the wind was blowing perpendicular to the row of hives, only one
> got most of the 4 puffs of smoke, others got less than 4 puffs, and some
> adjacent "unsmoked" hives got a bit of smoke drift.
>
> In less than two minutes, the numbers of outgoing bees dropped off
> dramatically in the "smoked" hives.  But closer examination showed the
> numbers of outgoing bees decreased in all hives, even those just getting a
> bit of drift.  Numbers of incoming bees, as expected, did not change much.
>
> But here's the interesting part, we smoked the bees early in the afternoon
> and the effect lasted through the evening - they never returned to full
> activity as compared to flight for the previous or following days.  Not
> surprisingly, the more smoke, the more obvious the effect.
 
Hi Jerry and All,   This goes along with some of the old writting about,
not working with your bees all the time. I know that bees do get upset if
you smoke them too much.You will have many more bees hanging on the front
of the hive.
  Having the Bees set up in MD with the ability to count flight numbers ,
is a great tool.This is a big step forward. It will bring up even more
questions on Bee behavior.We should get some answers also.
 Pheromones and smoke is very interesting.The why , smoke will calm a hive
down , should lead us to , what is the best smoke? See it never ends.
 Has there been any work done on different smoking material.Beekeepers
work that out on there own.I know some smoke is mild and others will knock
you over if your in its path.
 This is a very good subject and thanks to those working on it.
 Best Regards
 Roy