>Paul Stamets and WSU are doing some very interesting work on the question of bees collecting fugal extracts 

There was work done here in Australia many years ago with bees collecting fungi spores.

I was involved in one area where the bees were collecting fruiting spores from fungi growing in "Mill mud".  "Mill mud" is the dirt etc. that comes from the sugar mill when sugar cane is crushed.  It was put out in a  paddock and the fungi then germinated.  The bees then came along and collected the spores from those fungi.  We had pollen traps on the hives to collect spores which were collected, by the bees, in the same way as pollen.

Also we have rust on our frangipani trees just before autumn (fall) then they lose their leaves.  The bees work the rust for spores and again collect in the same way as pollen.

There are also other examples of bees collecting spores from other fungi.

Trevor Weatherhead
Australia

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