Jan. 1, 1S70.] 



HAKDWICKE'S S CIEN CE- GOSSI P. 



describedpfsmw albicans, which is a similar kind of 

 hair-worm, from two to five inches long, and whitish 

 in colour. This worm is also found, strangely 

 enough, only in the drones, though it is the workers 

 which frequent watery places to appease their 

 thirst. 



Thousands of insects are carried off yearly by 

 parasitic fungi. The ravages of the Muscardine, 

 caused by a minute fungus (Botrytis Bassiana, 

 Balsamo), has threatened the extinction of silk cul- 

 ture in Europe. Dr. Leidy mentions a fungus which 

 must annually carry off myriads of the seventeen- 

 year locust. A somewhat similar fungus, Miccor 

 mellitophorus (fig. 15), infests bees, filling the sto- 



Fig. 15. 



Fig. 10. 



Mucor mellituphorus. 



Beetle larva. 



mach with microscopic colourless spores, so as to 

 greatly weaken the insect. 



As there is a probability that many insects, para- 

 sitic on the wild bees, may sooner or later afflict the 

 honey-bee, and also to farther illustrate the complex 

 nature of insect parasitism, we will for a moment 

 look at some other bee-parasites. 



Among the numerous insects preying iu some way 

 upon the humble-bee are to be found other species 

 of bees and moths, flies and beetles. Insect 

 parasites often imitate their host : Apathus can 

 scarcely be distinguished from its host, and yet it 

 lives cuckoo-like in the cells of the humble-bee, 

 though we know not yet how injurious it really is. 

 Then there is the Conops and Volucella, the former 

 of which lives like Tachina and Phora within the 

 bee's body, while the latter devours the brood. The 

 young of another fly allied to Anthomyia, of which 

 the onion-fly is an example, is also not uufrequently 

 met with. A small beetle {Antherophagus ochraceus) 

 is a common inmate of humble-bees' nests, and 

 probably feeds upon the wax and pollen. We have 

 also found several larvae (fig. 16) of a beetle of which 

 we do not know the adult form. Of similar habits 

 is probably a small moth {Nephopteryx Edmundsii) 



which undoubtedly feeds upon the waxen walls of 

 the bee-cells, and thus, like the attacks of the com- 

 mon bee-moth {Galleria cereana), whose habits are 

 so well known as not to detain us, must prove very 

 prejudicial to the wellbeing of the colony. This 

 moth is in turn infested by an Ichneumon-fly 

 {Microgaster Nephoptericis), which must destroy 

 many of them. 



A minute Ichneumon (Anthophorabia Megachilis) 

 which is parasitic on Megachile, the leaf-cutter bee, 

 illustrates the transformations of the Ichneumon- 

 flies, the smallest species of which yet known (and 

 we believe the smallest insect known at all) is the 

 Pteratomus Putnami, or " winged-atom," which is 

 only one-ninetieth of an inch in length, and is 

 parasitic on Anthophorabia, itself a parasite. A 

 species of mite is always to be found in humble-bees' 

 nests, but it is not thought to be specially obnoxious 

 to the bees themselves, though several species of 

 mites (Gamasus, &c.) are known to be parasitic on 

 insects. 



Por a proper study of our bees and wasps, we 

 should collect their nests from the end of May until 

 late in the Autumn. We should watch for the 

 different broods and collect the larva, pupa, and 

 adult of both sexes, as well as the workers. The 

 cells containing the young, with whatever parasites 

 may be found on them, may be placed in alcohol, 

 while the mature bees may be pinned. The simplest 

 method of collecting the nests of humble-bees is to 

 visit them before sunrise or after sunset, when the 

 bees are in the nest, and we can secure the whole 

 colony. The bees can be picked up with forceps as 

 they emerge from the nest, or caught with the net 

 and then pinned. Refractory colonies may be easily 

 quelled by pouring in ether or chloroform, or 

 burning sulphur at the aperture, as is the best 

 method of procedure with wasps' nests. 



The solitary species, besides boring in the earth 

 like Andrena and Halictus, also bore in the stems 

 of different plants, such as the elder, syringa, 

 raspberry, and blackberry. Nearly fifty species of 

 insects, mostly Hymenoptera, are known in Prance 

 to burrow in the stems of the blackberry alone ! 

 Now is the time to look for their burrows in 

 the dead branches. Their presence is usually 

 detected by an old hole at the end of a broken 

 branch. The writer would be greatly obliged 

 for material to aid him in the study of our bees 

 and wasps, and would take pleasure in corre- 

 sponding with those interested in the study of their 

 habits, and would be very grateful for specimens of 

 the young in alcohol, their parasites and nests. — 

 The American Naturalist, for June, 1868. 



We never can surprise Nature in a corner ; never 

 find the end of a thread ; never tell where to set 

 the first stone.— Emerson's Essays. 



