ECOLOGY 279 



In the hive, the bee regurgitates the thin solution of sugar which is 

 received and placed in a cell of the honeycomb by a house servant. The 

 water is evaporated by currents of air, set up by fanning by the wings of 

 the bees. During this process the honey is tongued and tested by another 

 class of workers. When a cell is full of sufficiently concentrated honey, it 

 is capped over with wax and sealed. Now this honey, or nectar, serves as 

 the carbohydrate ration for the bee, but pure cane sugar syrup does just as 

 well. Consequently we may take away from the bees all the honey they 

 make and feed them during the winter on a sugar syrup. At this point their 

 digestions are very much like our own, but the inversion of cane sugar 

 in both cases is due primarily to the nature of the sugar molecules, not 

 to the relation between bees and men. Nor should it be assumed that all 

 protoplasms can use the sugars interchangeably. Many bacteria can use but 

 one or a few kinds of sugar and will absolutely starve if given only some 

 other kinds. 



Well-finished honey is about 20 per cent, water. A colony of bees will 

 consume from 20 to 40 pounds of honey during the winter months when 

 they can not leave their hives. For each pound of honey consumed, at least 

 three quarters of a pound of water and one half a pound of carbon dioxide 

 will be exhaled by the bees. That is, a hive of bees generates seven to ten 

 quarts of water during the winter, all of which must be expelled from the 

 hive. It is a delicate matter to get enough ventilation to eliminate the mois- 

 ture, and yet not take in enough cold air to freeze the bees. Sometimes the 

 water does condense on the inside walls and top of the hive. If it drips down 

 and freezes at the entrance to the hive, completely stopping the entrance, 

 the colony will quickly die for lack of air. 



The production of carbon dioxide by bees, as by other animals, increases 

 with the temperature and the activity of the animals. When cold and at 

 rest, bees produce but little carbon dioxide and need but little air. One cold 

 evening in early winter, I moved two hives, disturbing the bees and setting 

 them in motion. For some hours afterward it was necessary for them to 

 keep up a vigorous fanning with their wings at the entrance of the hive 

 in order to expel the vitiated air and to draw in enough fresh, cool air. On 

 moving one hundred hives of bees one autumn, we packed the entrances 

 tight with soft snow in order to keep the bees from emerging. But the bees 

 directed a current of warm air against the snow and melted holes through 

 it in from three to five minutes. 



In winter, or at any time of rest, the bees cluster together in a solid mass. 

 Those at the center are constantly working out to the surface of the mass, 

 while those at the surface are working in. A neighbor undertaking to kill 

 a small colony by freezing, uncovered the hive, spread the combs apart, 

 and left them overnight. The next morning, with the temperature at io°F., 

 all the bees were still alive. By remaining in a compact mass and continually 



