Adrian M. Wenner wrote:

> One can also conduct a very simple experiment to ascertain the
>attractiveness of Nasanov gland exudates to bees that search for food
>sources.

Reply:

While may species of bees are known to mark nectar sources, this can hardly
account for their ability to send recruits to sites many miles distant. I am
reminded of the story of the two guys fishing in a lake.

"This is a great spot we have here", one says, "How are we going to find it
again?"

"We'll paint a big 'X' here in the bottom of the boat", says the other.

"But what if we don't get the same boat?"

* * *


Both the honeybee and stingless-bee systems, Nieh notes, mix resumably
simple methods, like scents, with fancier ones, like specialized motion.
"There are many ways information can get garbled," he says. "It's good to be
redundant."

The supposedly simpler methods, trailing scent droplets like bread
crumbs, for example, could tip off competitors as well as the crew from the
home nest. What happens inside a nest, however, becomes much harder for
foreigners to observe.

Advantageous as that shift inside might be, it does require some way to
abstractly represent the larger world. Such a system might develop
under pressures of intense competition from other hives. Or, to put it
another way, representational language could be just one way of countering
espionage.

http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc99/4_3_99/bob1.htm

* * *

Oh, and this:

Social bees can deposit specialized glandular
secretions, or signals, that allow foragers to revisit
rewarding and to avoid unrewarding food sources.
However, it is not known if bees can orient towards
olfactory cues such as excreta deposited near food
sources. We report that Melipona mandacaia foragers
(stingless bees) deposit an odor cue, anal droplets, and a
previously undescribed ventro-abdominal odor on food
sources. Surprisingly, foragers deposited attractive odor
marks on good food sources to which they recruited and
on poor food sources to which they did not recruit.
Foragers left the most anal droplets on dilute food sources
to which they did not recruit (1.25-M sucrose solution),
yet returning foragers were attracted to anal droplets
obtained on poor food sources and presented in bioassays.
Foragers were attracted to ventro-abdominal odors obtained
on good food sources (2.5-M sucrose solution).
Chemical extractions suggest that odor marks contain
attractive polar compounds. We also provide the first
detailed description of forager waggling and spinning
behavior on poor and good food sources. Waggling may
be a method of dispersing anal droplets and spinning may
help foragers learn local landmarks.

from

Multi-source odor-marking of food by a stingless bee
Behav Ecol Sociobiol (2003) 54:578–586

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