Caffeinated Bees
You know that fiendish caffeine addiction that keeps swarms of humans buzzing in and out of cafes to get regular coffee fixes? It turns out that bees are also hooked on the stuff, too. Apparently, 55 percent of flowering plants produce caffeine in their nectar. Bees are more likely to go to the caffeinated nectar, and they get really excited over it.
In an experiment published in the journal Current Biology, researchers filled two containers with nectar and added caffeine to one of them. Bees that drank the caffeinated nectar were more likely to perform the waggle dance for other bees upon returning to the hive, which is essentially how they tell the others about the quality and location of the nectar they find.[10] The caffeinated nectar caused the bees to dance more vigorously, indicating that the quality of the nectar was better than it actually was.
This isn’t surprising, since a lot of us use caffeine to at least appear enthusiastic about work. The caffeine-producing plants are likely to attract lots of bees, since the bee visitors give them such glowing reviews, thus assuring that their pollen gets spread around.
I guess we have more in common with brother bee than we thought. The very thought kinda gives me a Buzz, ya know?
Coffee out on the rain cooled patio this morning. Watch out for the bee, OK?
