Bee keepers use smoke to calm "angry" bees so the keepers can take honey from the hive. How does the smoke cause the bees to relax?

ilikepizza12

Though the secret of smoking bees has been known for thousands of years, the scientific explanation for how it works is more recent. Under normal circumstances if a beehive is threatened, guard bees will release a volatile pheromone substance, iso-pentyl acetate, better known as an alarm odor. This alerts the middle-aged bees in the hive — the ones with the most venom — to defend the hive by attacking the intruder. When smoke is blown into the hive first, however, the guard bees' receptors are dulled and they fail to sound the pheromonious alarm. Conveniently the smoke has a secondary effect in that it causes the other bees to instinctively gorge themselves on honey — a survival instinct in case they must vacate the hive and recreate it elsewhere. This gorging has a tendency to pacify the bees. -http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-bee-smoker.htm Mar 03 07, 5:57 PM

lanfranco

Evidently, smoke initiates a "feeding response" in bees, so that they eat, instead of swarm and attack, out of fear that they will have to leave the hive owing to a fire threat. Moreover, it also masks the pheromone response in the guard bees. There's a link to a site on "Bee Smokers" here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beekeeping Mar 03 07, 5:59 PM

toughynutter

"When bees are smoked, they engorge with honey and become gentle. " http://www.answers.com/topic/beekeeping-1 "Bees respond to smoke by filling up on honey so that they are less likely to sting." http://www.tve.org/ho/doc.cfm?aid=889 Mar 03 07, 6:00 PM

star_gazer

Thank you all. Isn't that facinating! Mar 03 07, 8:45 PM