Sydney, Feb 09: Bees seem silly creatures. Trapped in a house or a car, their navigational skills fail them and they fly into anything but the window opened for their escape. Researchers at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra know better. Bees, they say, are clever critters able to remember exactly where their last meal came from and to steer in that direction. Their navigational system can process information on smell, colour and even distance, researcher Mandyam Srinivasan told the Sydney Morning Herald. ''The scent triggers navigational memories of where to go and what the colour of the flowers will be - a bit like a whiff of cologne might remind you of someone you knew a long time ago,'' Srinivasan said. The research team proved the amazing capability of the honeybee by a simple experiment that entailed setting up two different feeders 50 metres from their hive, one containing rose-scented sugar water and the other lemon-scented sugar water. Whichever scent was blown into the hive, the bees raced off for a snack at that feeder. When the feeders were swapped with empty, unscented ones, the bees still took their cue from a particular scent and flew off to where they had once found nourishment. The ANU team reckon the findings have implications for mankind and could lead to the further development of pilotless ''drone'' aircraft and robots. Bureau Report