Hi all Just got back to the list so this post is to stuff from a while back: Donald Aiken wrote in response to my post about having tried to kill a swarm that had been aggravated with H2S and it having gone very quite instead of dying. > In a really peculiar coincidence, on Tuesday I was taking the last >supers from a yard of bees that is about 100 yards (meters?) from a >gas well that was being serviced. This field is a sour gas field, >and there was a mild smell of H2S carried to us on the wind which >was blowing directly from the rig toward me. I remarked on how >peaceful my bees were when I got home but I did not make the >connection with the H2S. The concentration was extremely low, so the >effect must be quite powerful. extremely low, so the effect must be >quite powerful. I asked around a bit about H2S and aparently, the point at which it becomes toxic to a person is when you can no longer smell it. Apparently it binds to certain active sites in enzymes with metal ions in or something to that effect. When one uses smoke, there must be a certain amount of CO carbon monoxide that would have a similat effect, but to a lessor degree to that of H2S. What I would be interested to know is if anybody has noticed this peacefulness of the bees near other sources of either of these gases as well or any other gases such as hydrogen cyanide (gold mines in Canada and Australia?) and maybe near highways and so on. It often has intrigued me that a hive in the middle of my town is extremely passive even al;though it is directly above a busy road in an oak tree? Could this be a factor? The bees response to anger is blind because all their receptor sites for anger pheremones are blocked with some or other particle? Just a thought. Keep well Garth --- Garth Cambray Kamdini Apiaries 15 Park Road Apis melifera capensis Grahamstown 800ml annual precipitation 6139 Eastern Cape South Africa Phone 27-0461-311663 3rd year Biochemistry/Microbiology Rhodes University In general, generalisations are bad. Interests: Flii's and Bees.