Bees also love a pick-me-up in the form of caffeinated nectar, leading them to forage more and recruit their friends to try a caffeinated treat themselves. Researchers, however, has found that this doesn't always work in the bee's favor.
According to a new study, published Oct. 15, in the journal Current Biology, while caffeine makes bees more efficient pollinators, they kept returning to lower-quality forage every time - and plants, aware of caffeine's pull, may be luring them back in.
Dr. Margaret Couvillon from the University of Sussex and her team described a new way in which some plants, through secondary compounds in nectar like caffeine, "may be tricking the honey bee by securing loyal and faithful foraging and recruitment behaviors" without necessarily offering top-quality forage.
Earlier research found that caffeine makes honey bees learn and remember their routes to the correct flower better, and this is considered good news in fighting colony collapse disorder or the worldwide decline in honey bee population.
The National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) reported that colony collapse disorder affects 42 percent of bee colonies in the United States this year alone, pointing to pesticides as a major cause.
The new study has established [pdf] that caffeine and prompted bees to forage more and recruit others to the caffeinated plants through their "waggle dance." The caffeine quadrupled the recruitment dances compared to when uncaffeinated sources are involved.
"The effects of caffeine in nectar are akin to drugging," said co-author Roger Schürch of the University of Sussex and the University of Bern, citing that the bees are tricked into valuing the nectar as higher-quality than it actually is.
The findings suggested that caffeinated nectar could reduce the bee colonies' honey production if plants indeed reduced their nectar's sweetness - a show of competing interests.
To Dr. Couvillon, this makes the bees "exploited pollinators," with the plants tricking them into foraging in ways beneficial to the plant and not to them.
The team also sparked interest in knowing if plants lacing their nectar with another secondary compound also produce less sweet nectar - a way to "get the upper hand" on the pollinators.
Photo: Andy Murray | Flickr
