North Carolina Bee School Practice Exam

What chemical compounds do bees use for communication?

1. Citronella

2. Propylene Glycol

3. Pheromones

4. Essential Oils

The correct answer is: Pheromones

Bees utilize pheromones as chemical signals to communicate with one another. Pheromones are specific chemical compounds released by an individual that influence the behavior or physiological state of other members of the same species. These substances play a crucial role in various aspects of bee life, such as signaling alarm, marking foraging paths, coordinating hive activities, and establishing dominance hierarchies within the colony. For example, when a bee is threatened, it releases alarm pheromones that alert other bees in the hive to a potential danger, prompting them to either prepare for defense or flee. Similarly, queen bees produce specific pheromones that help maintain the social structure of the colony by preventing other females from reproducing and signaling her presence and health to the worker bees. In contrast, the other options, such as citronella and essential oils, are more commonly associated with human products and applications rather than natural bee communication. Citronella is often used as an insect repellent, while essential oils have various uses in aromatherapy and cosmetics, but they do not play a role in bee communication in the same way pheromones do. Propylene glycol is primarily a synthetic compound used in food and pharmaceutical products and does not relate to how bees communicate. Thus,