Michael Reddell wrote a number of things about wool.
 
This intrigued me and I will ad my observations:
 
> My personal and totally untested theory is that processed wool
>human scent mimics the scent of some historical predator of bees,
>such as bears (or maybe even humans who, after all, have worn wool
>and robbed bees, probably at the same time, for thousands of years.)
 
The bees here in South Africa also attack wool. Wool is not a common
ingredient here, although ancient hunter gatherers are known to have
kept fat tailed sheep they never did anything with the wool. Bears
are also no wool like, and don't occur here, yet bees still attack
wool socks. (I have had this happen on a number of occasions when I
walked by a beehive and the guards buzzed my whole body and stung my
socks.
 
Socks are made from wool because it is an absorbtive material. When a
bee stings it would seem it would need a trigger to tell it what to
attack. Bees have compound vision so one can assume that what they
see is big and blurry and when they are close to it, it will appear
motionless. Hence a big smooth surface will not trigger the sting
response? So if they find a fluffy sock they may attack as it would
'feel' like a place where the furr on the target animal is thin. They
sting and marker pheremones are released into the wool, which is
absorbtive. Hence a marker is made from a sock and the more stings,
the more stings will come.
 
My theory. I have noticed this with some gloves I have which have a
spot on one finger which is a bit fluffy as the leather is worn and
it always gets stung into a pincussion type thing. If the surface is
absorbtive and bees happen to sting it once, the chances are, due to
markers, it will be stung again.
 
Keep well
 
Garth
 
---
Garth Cambray       "Opinions expressed in this post may be those
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In general, generalisations are bad.
But don't worry BEEEEEE happy.