266 State Board of Agkiculture, &c, 



contradictory if, when they have been so instrument;!] iti 

 the growth of fruit, they should now prove its worst enemy. 



From the structure of the mouth of the bee it would a])- 

 pear poorly adapted for cutting into fruits. But whtit are 

 the facts in the case ? I Hn<l, in looking ov^er the testi- 

 mony in favoi' of the l)ees, cutting the skins of delicate 

 fruits and thus doing great harm, that tlie evidence is 

 mostly quite indefinite. The bees do tlie mischief because 

 they, do, say these persons who regard the honey bees as 

 their enemies, or because the fi-uit is covei-ed w^ith them, 

 or because that in some Report of Agriculture some one 

 says they do, or, perchance, because some bee keeper ad- 

 mits that the bee may do such things. Such testimony, it 

 seems to me, would not prove very valuable in any of our 

 courts of justice. I feel that I can not do better than to 

 give the positive evidence of a very few persons tliat bees 

 never molest perfect fruit, wliich seems of much more 

 weight than a large number of mere opinions to the con- 

 trary. 



Says H. O. Kruschke, of Greene, Wisconsin, in the Nevi 

 York Tribune of December 31st, 1873 : '' I took a bun<di 

 of Delaware grapes (the tenderest I could tind,) and put 

 them on the liive, directly over the bees, and watched tlie 

 proceedings, but not a single berry was punctured. Then 

 I broke a few of the l)erries, upon wliich they immediately 

 went to work and sucked them dry — tlius showing that 

 something besides the bees must o|)en the grapes or any 

 other fruit before the bees can touch it." 



The experience of J. W. Bayard, of Athens, Ohio, is so 

 much to the point that I am tempted to give it also. He 



