Knox Box of Miscellany

Dawn Knox – A rearranger of words into something hopefully meaningful…

Bee-Witching!

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Bees busy on flower collecting pollen and nectar

Bees busy on flower collecting pollen and nectar

Monday was a day full of bees. We went to the RHS Garden at Wisley and of course, there were plenty of insects and butterflies and of course – bees.

On Monday evening, on BBC2 there was a really interesting programme about bees – ‘Hive Alive’, which was fascinating.

I knew a little about bees, such as their strange ‘waggle dance’, which tells other bees where to go for a good supply of nectar and pollen but I had no idea that a flower could signal to bees that its nectar supply is low. Apparently, flowers have a negative electrical field which the bee can detect.  The bee’s positive charge interacts with the flower’s negative charge and changes the flower’s electrical signature. When the bee has taken its fill of nectar and flies off, the electrical signature changes, warning other bees that nectar supplies are low and that it’s not worth their while stopping to look. The electrical signature remains changed for about 100 seconds, sufficient time for the flower to replenish its nectar and regain its negative charge. Since bees visit about 2,000 flowers a day, they need to maximise their efficiency, not wasting time on ’empty’ flowers. Ingenious eh?

One thing that Daffodil noticed when she slipped back to the Victorian times was the change in air quality and the sound of birds and other animals. And perhaps the change in the pace of life. I expect Victorian bees had an easier time of things than modern bees with fewer pesticides and herbicides than we have now.  If you would like to read more, ‘Daffodil and the Thin Place’ can be found here.

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