Humble-Bees* 



345 



her long tongue to the honey-pot at such times as slie requires food for herself. 

 ]\Iuch oi this is used up in the production of heat to keep up the temperature of the 

 nest night and day. The honev-pot is always undergoing changes when it is in use. 

 When full it is relativelv tall and has a small mouth. As the honey gets lower 

 so do the walls of the pot in agreement, and when it is refilled the walls are built 

 up again. But after about a month, when there are workers about to assist the 

 mother, the waxen pot is neglected and falls into ruin. The honey is of a more fluid 

 character than that stored by the honey-bee. 



The legless grubs when they are about five days old increase the size of the 

 hollows in which they repose, each occupying its own cell in the food-mass ; and 

 two days later each spins a tough papery cocoon. The mother about this time 

 clears away the brown wax she had been continually adding to for the protection 

 of the grubs, and the clearance reveals the upper ends of all these cocoons standing 

 side by side. A depression 

 runs through the middle of 

 the group, which indicates 

 where the mother's body 

 has lain in her brooding 

 vigils. This groove she 

 continues to occupy, for 

 her offspring still need 

 warmth to help their de- 

 velopment, even when thc\- 

 have changed into chr\-sa- 

 lids. On the twent3'-second 

 or twenty-third day after 

 the eggs were laid she has 

 the reward for all her 

 labour and care, for the 

 chrysalids develop into 

 bees, which begin to 

 through the tops of 

 cocoons and emerge. 



I'hoto t/vj 



Humble-Bee Chrys.\lids. 



A couple ol chrysalids an- here shown, much enlarged. The first is a view of the under 

 side with the legs, tongue, and antenna* folded down to the body. In the second the 

 upper side is shown, with the wings folded down the sidc-s. This stage lasts about a 

 fortnight. 



bite 

 the 



In this they are assisted by the mother, who enlarges 

 the openings to make their exit easier. The newly emerged bees are all small 

 workers, and as soon as their legs and wings have become firm and their 

 wetted, matted coats are dry, they begin to assist the mother in collecting 

 provisions for their larval sisters. For all this time, the mother-bee has been making 

 other cells and filling them with eggs, so that the broods come on with intervals of 

 only two or three days between them. 



The new workers start collecting out of doors when only three or four days 

 out of the cocoons, and do their work at once as though they had been trained 

 to it. Every few days they are joined by later emergences — all workers for a time. 

 Tater, the mother lays eggs which j^roduce males and females. The cells for the 

 second and later batches of eggs arc built on the sides of the taller cocoons, so that 

 they can derive warmth from the mother's body as she is imparting it to her first 



