HYMENOPTERA 383 



then the old queen with a goodly portion of her subjects swarms out, and 

 they go to start a new colony. 



The swarming of the honey-bee is essential to the continued existence 

 of the species; for in social insects it is as necessary for the colonies to be 

 multiplied as it is that there should be a reproduction of individuals. 

 Otherwise, as the colonies were destroyed the species would become ex- 

 tinct. With the social wasps and with the bumblebees the old queen and 

 the young ones remain together peacefully in the nest; but at the close 

 of the season the nest is abandoned by all as an unfit place for passing 

 the winter, and in the following spring each young queen founds a new 

 colony. Thus there is a tendency towards a great multiplication of 

 colonies. But with the honey-bee the habit of storing food for the winter, 

 and the nature of the habitations render it possible for the colonies to 

 exist indefinitely. And thus if the old and young queens remained to- 

 gether peacefully there would be no multiplication of colonies, and the 

 species would surely die out in time. We see, therefore, that what appears 

 to be merely jealousy on the part of the queen honey-bee is an instinct 

 necessary to the continuance of the species. 



The sting of a queen-bee is no ignoble weapon, but it is rarely used 

 except against a rival queen. When several young queens mature at the 

 same time there is a pitched battle for supremacy, and the last left living 

 on the field becomes the head of the colony. One morning we found the 

 lifeless bodies of fifteen young queens cast forth from a single hive — a 

 monument to the powers of the surviving Amazon in triumphant posses- 

 sion within. 



The materials used by bees are wax and propolis, which serve as 

 materials for construction; and honey and bee-bread used for food. 



The comb is made of wax, which is an excretion of the bees. When 

 a colony needs wax, many of the workers gorge themselves with honey 

 and then hang quietly in a curtain-like mass, the upper bees clinging to 

 the roof of the hive, and the lower ones to the bees above them. After 

 about twenty-four hours there appear on the lower surface of the abdo- 

 men of each bee little plates of wax that are forced out from openings 

 between the ventral abdominal segments called wax-pockets. Other 

 workers attend to this curtain and collect the wax as fast as it appears, 

 and use it at once in constructing comb. 



Propolis is a cement used for cementing up crevices, and is made of a 

 resin which the bees collect from the buds of various trees, but especially 

 of the poplar. 



Honey is made from the nectar of flowers. The nectar is taken into 

 the crop of the bee, and there changed into honey, and then regurgitated 

 into the cells of the comb. 



Bee-bread is made from the pollen of flowers, which the bees bring in 

 on the plates fringed with hairs on the hind legs, the corbiculae. 



Families of the Hymenoptera not discussed 



The order Hymenoptera contains a large number of families the mem- 

 bers of which are rarely seen. The following list includes those families 

 of which no account is given here. The student can find them discussed 

 in "An Introduction to Entomology" by J. H. Comstock. 



