474. The intelligence in honeybees in finding their way back.

Verse (16:68) of the Quran says, the Almighty created an intuition within the honey bee to traverse their path with ease.

Scientists recently have discovered the honey bees excel in their knowledge of their routes they fly about.

The following is the report of the study about bees under taken by the biology scientists at the Holloway University in Britain:

The bees travel long distances looking out for home, they make use of a lot of shortcuts in their flight paths. We observed the bees with the help of artificial flowers in a computer study and found them using shortcuts to fly to different flowers in search of nectar. 

These shortcuts used by the bees looking out for nectar were far better than the computerized charts spilled out for sales representatives. Thus proving the intelligence of bees being far higher than that of the computers, is declared by the scientists.

The fact the bees have an intelligence to find their way in a maze of plants, as declared by the Quran, proves it is the word of God.

Finding out shortcuts need not necessarily mean an easy way being discovered, but it has to be the correct one.

If the bee can sense the exact availability of nectar among the flowers and fruits can their flight be considered as less arduous, and not going about sensing each and every flower only to return disappointed when they do not find the required nectar in some, rendering the flight useless.

And scientists have discovered lately the sensing power of the bees to be very precise.

Professor Nikolov Keceik of the Department of Agriculture of the Zagreb University undertook a study to make use of the sensing power of the bees to pinpoint the location of landmines left over as a legacy of the war between Croatia and Serbia.

He initially discovered the bees had the power to sense the presence of nectar in flowers and fruits at long distances. 

The bees were at first made to be accustomed to the smell of TNT (used in the land mines) laced with nectar. Later the bees, thus accustomed to the smell of TNT were trained in such a way they considered TNT is part of nectar.

After having trained the bees in such a manner. A set of nectar laced with TNT and another set without it was placed close to the hive. The bees chose to land on the set laced with TNT.

And then a set of nectar fully covered with the TNT only in its center and not on its outer sides was placed, the bees again chose to land on the set with TNT on its center.

Normally bees do not not go in search of the smell of explosives, but when trained on these kinds of material, get used to it.

And the bees thus trained could be used to identify the mines under the surface when they land on the locations, the mines buried can be deftly removed as the result of the research.

Professor Nikolov while talking about this research said ‘We believe this research will help us to a great extent in identifying landmines buried under the surface of the earth by making use of the bees and the infrared rays to monitor their activities. If this research becomes scientifically proven it can be used to remove dangerous landmines with the help of bees and monitoring them with the help of infrared rays. 

Though the feasibility of identifying land mines with the help of dogs and rats exists, the weight of these animals risks an explosion at the site, the bees do not pose such a risk, and he says the research involving bees to identify landmines has been carried out in the United States. 

Today there are various researches being carried out, regarding this subject, but fourteen centuries ago the Quran revealing the special characteristics of the honey bees only known to the Almighty proves it is the word of God.