Sensory Physiology in Bees
- Chelsea Burgess
- Oct 1, 2020
- 3 min read
Updated: Dec 21, 2020
Mammal sensory information, such as our sense of smell, touch, taste, hearing, and visual cues are vastly different than what information bees can gather from their surroundings. Images that appear to us in certain colors may be completely different in the eyes of a bee. Certain flavors may be intense for humans but almost undetectable in bees.
Sight
There are a total of 5 eyes on a bee: two larger compound eyes and three simple eyes. The compound eyes are used to gather information about a broader picture, while the three compound eyes are only able to detect light [5]. Bees and many other insects (see: project on ladybugs) can only view light wavelengths ranging from 300 nm to 650 nm. Green and blue are a significant part of what bees can see under the visible light spectrum. [3]They are unable to perceive red visible light, but they are well within range of sensing ultraviolet light. This is important because certain flowers can attract bees due to certain UV colored patterns on the petals of flowers. These lines cannot be seen by humans, but appear as a landing spot for a bee, making pollination a more likely event. Vision is also useful for seeing flowers further away that may not be able to be detected with their sense of smell. They are also capable of distinguishing between light and dark objects, but rounded shapes are more difficult to differentiate because of smoother lines [4].
Smell & Taste
The antennae on the head of a bee detect chemical changes in the environment. Smells can come from liquids like nectar, airborne particles, or from other bee antennae. The chemoreceptors on the antennae are important communication tools for all hymenopterans because the unique hydrocarbon signatures that can relay information about if that particular insect is familiar or not. For longer ranges of chemical signaling, bees can release pheromones to others, such as alarm pheromones, to warn others of dangers [6]. Bees no not rely much on their sense of taste. There are 10 receptors in a bee's brain for taste but there are 163 receptors for smell [3].
Touch
In areas of little to no light, such as inside a hive, there is no visual information bees can rely on. Therefore, they must use communication in the form of vibrations instead. A bee can walk up to another member of the hive to vibrate a message, which will be perceived using the small hairs all over the bee's body and transformed to nerve signals in order to be decoded. These messages can be responded to as well in the same manner [3].
Hearing
It was long believed that bees had no sense of hearing, up until 1989 when Towne and Kirschner performed a study which revealed that bees can be conditioned to associate a sound with pain reception activated by a small shock (Towne and Kirschner, 1989)[7]. They also found that bees use sound to convey messages in dance communication and can perceive sounds up to 500 Hz. The key to hearing in bees is the Johnston's organ located in their antennae, which detect the motion of vibrations between 265 - 350 Hz [7][8].
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Viesinsh. (2006). Trust in teamwork of bees bridging two bee swarm parts. Getty Images. Retrieved October 25, 2020, from https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/trust-in-teamwork-of-bees-bridging-two-bee-swarm-royalty-free-image/478066390
Wilson-Rich, N., Allin, K., Carreck, N., & Quigley, A. (2014). The Bee A Natural History. Princeton University Press.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/immunology-and-microbiology/bee
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