Thought the following item might be of interest to the list ...

Perfumes stir up a hornet's nest

Wasps may be provoked into a frenzy of attack by chemicals sometimes
found in perfumes and food, warn Japanese scientists.

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s919335.htm

Wasps may be provoked into a frenzy of attack by chemicals sometimes
found in perfumes and food, warn Japanese scientists.

Bee keepers have observed for many years that perfume will anger the honey
bees. Also when women were first stationed aboard Coast Guard ocean going
vessels, one of the first new regulations was "no perfume on the bridge".
Coincidence?

Gary
Retired US Coast Guard
Ex bee keeper
Presently green thumb-wantabee


"Wilson da Silva" wrote in message
om...
Thought the following item might be of interest to the list ...

Perfumes stir up a hornet's nest

Wasps may be provoked into a frenzy of attack by chemicals sometimes
found in perfumes and food, warn Japanese scientists.

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s919335.htm

Wasps may be provoked into a frenzy of attack by chemicals sometimes
found in perfumes and food, warn Japanese scientists.

In article , "gary" writes:
| Bee keepers have observed for many years that perfume will anger the honey
| bees. Also when women were first stationed aboard Coast Guard ocean going
| vessels, one of the first new regulations was "no perfume on the bridge".
| Coincidence?

Problems with the SeaBees?


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

On 7 Aug 2003 00:42:49 -0700, (Wilson da Silva) wrote:

Thought the following item might be of interest to the list ...

Perfumes stir up a hornet's nest

Wasps may be provoked into a frenzy of attack by chemicals sometimes
found in perfumes and food, warn Japanese scientists.

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s919335.htm

Wasps may be provoked into a frenzy of attack by chemicals sometimes
found in perfumes and food, warn Japanese scientists.

Nothing surprising there. This has been know for many, many years.
I my house we use unsented shampoo, hairspray, etc. My wife has
noticed a big difference how they react to her long hair.

Isolating the specific chemicals that cause the alarm may be of some
use to companies if they wish to develop perfumes that cause less of
a problem. (On the other hand it could be evidence to sue a
manufacturer because their product caused a hornet/wasp/bee attack)

-Tim

"Nick Maclaren" wrote in message
...

In article , "gary"
writes:
| Bee keepers have observed for many years that perfume will anger the
honey
| bees. Also when women were first stationed aboard Coast Guard ocean
going
| vessels, one of the first new regulations was "no perfume on the
bridge".
| Coincidence?

Problems with the SeaBees?


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

Groan! But kinda funny. G

John

Problems with the SeaBees?

Yuck, yuck, yuck.

I suspect the reason perfumes make the little critters react is
because lots of them are musk based & they're responding to the
underlying animal scent.

On Thu, 7 Aug 2003 13:11:27 -0700, Ken wrote:

I suspect the reason perfumes make the little critters react is
because lots of them are musk based & they're responding to the
underlying animal scent.

Two comments:

1. They said that the culprits in this study were 2-pentanol,
3-methyl-1-butanol and 1-methylbutyl 3-methylbutanoate, which are alcohols.
These sorts of alcohols and closely related esters are not only commonly used
as artificial fragrances and flavors but they are also found naturally in
various flowers and fruits (e.g. 3-methylbutyl acetate is banana fragrance).

It's intersting that comopunds which are secreted in the alarm pheromones of
vespids are in the same class of fragrant compounds found in plants. It's as
though the olfactory detectors of vespids are "tuned" to this class of
chemicals, and that some are preprogrammed by vespid nervous systems to mean
"food" whereas others are preprogrammed to mean "fight".

All speculation on my part. I notice also that 3-methyl-1-butanol and
1-methylbutyl 3-methylbutanoate are foul smelling compounds, which may occur
during decomposition.

2. I thought the following sentence in the article was pretty funny: "In
Japan, 74 people die each year from hornet stings." Those cold calculating
little *******s! A predetermined "death count" for humans! chortle


Tlacatecatl Tlacaxipe

Isolating the specific chemicals that cause the alarm may be of some
use to companies if they wish to develop perfumes that cause less of
a problem. (On the other hand it could be evidence to sue a
manufacturer because their product caused a hornet/wasp/bee attack)

-Tim

Right, slather on chemicals to make you smell like a flower and then
pursue litigation when they work!

In article ,
Beecrofter wrote:

Right, slather on chemicals to make you smell like a flower and
then pursue litigation when they work!

It's the American way!

--
http://www.spinics.net/beereading.html