Defence?

[BillS]

In checking stores today, I noticed many bees fanning,rear end up and stingers out. I'm sure they have done this before and I just didn't notice, but does any one know what they do this for? It looked like some kind of defence, but they were not acting defensive.

Bill S

[George Fergusson]

Hi Bill-

I've seen this. I took it to be a "Oh So happy to see you" greeting, NOT smile.gif The message was clear enough to me, they weren't stinging but they really didn't want to be disturbed. Through that action they are releasing the pheromone associated with their stinger- an alarm pheromone if not THE alarm pheromone. I too was checking feeders- I don't doubt for a second that in-my-face defensive action would have been forthcoming had I kept bothering them.

This was discussed a few times in recent months:

http://www.beesource.com/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=004851#000001

George-

[BillS]

Ok I checked out the link you provided (and all the links on the link) and that all fits. I guess I haven't seen this before cause I dodn't mess with the bees when it't cool, but this time I had to swap some frames of honey from a"have" to a "have not". Kind of neat, I was "mooned" by my own bees!

Bill S

[George Fergusson]

>I was "mooned" by my own bees!

That's one way to look at it smile.gif

I thought of it as "blowing me a kiss" but mooning is a better description. I tried to catch a picture of it last summer but never did. Perhaps this coming season. Facinating beehavior.

[Michael Bush]

It's normal. It's nasanov pheremone. They know they've been disrupted and want to make sure they can stay together.

[George Fergusson]

Really, nasonov with their stingers exposed? I've seen them fanning their nasonov glands. This seems like totally a different behavior.

[Michael Bush]

Maybe I should look more closely to see if I can see two different behavoirs. But usually the ones trying to set off an alarm will fly up and mark you, or sting you AND mark you.

[xC0000005]

I was watching a bee sun itself on my beesuit, and its abdomen was pulsing in and out. Not stinging, just sitting there, getting warmer. Eventually she flew back to the hive. I've had others land one me not doing the pulsing thing. Any idea what it was doing? Didn't seem to have stung (I've seen the stinger pulse like that). It wasn't fanning or anything, just sitting there calmly.

[thorbue]

I'm quite sure it's two different behaviors - Nassabov fanning and some sort of alert or defense behavior.
The defense one is quite common in some "not so nice" hives. Especially when you get that "knack" of propolis lifting of the crowboard

Thor

[George Fergusson]

They're certainly two different pheromones and I would therefore assume, associated with 2 different behaviors. The nasonov gland is easy to see when they expose it. The bees I've seen exposing their stingers and fanning were NOT exposing their nasonov glands.

To address Michael's comment, I haven't noticed wholesale overt defensive action on the part of a hive when there was stinger-fanning going on and it's not the same as being marked, or marked and stung- I've had that happen enough too smile.gif Perhaps it's a prelude to such action? The few times I've seen it, I was only peeking in to check feeders and didn't venture into the hive. Perhaps if I had...

[Michael Bush]

>Any idea what it was doing?

Breathing hard. Just like you do when you've been flying er I mean working. smile.gif

[FordGuy]

"Maybe I should look more closely to see if I can see two different behavoirs. But usually the ones trying to set off an alarm will fly up and mark you, or sting you AND mark you."


I posted something similar a while back about marking.

http://www.beesource.com/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=2;t=003772#000000