HYMENOPTERA—BEES 163 
completely exposed nectar that have been passed over by the solitary ia sibinaaied 
bees are not despised by the social forms. 
The honey-bee occupies a special place among the species that are most 
specialized with reference to flowers. As I was able to show in my work, ‘Blumen 
und Insekten auf den nordfriesischen Inseln’ (pp. 174, 175), Apis—at least in the 
district referred to—visits flowers of all classes and colours, though certainly giving 
preference to bee flowers. My later statistical investigations showed that the hive- 
bee also visits with special zest conspicuous social flowers, and flowers with nectar 
completely or partly concealed (‘Bliitenbesucher,’ II, p. 10). 
Hermann Miller obtained precisely similar results. In a hundred visits paid 
by the honey-bee, he observed that the various classes of flowers received the 
following numbers :— 
In the Lowlands, In the Alps. 
Be ed PO a Ter eae) 2! a) Brg 
Ie 2a TO eI a biG eon) a 
Lo ONY Gl aie Peo nee Caen EMS 1 sR 
Ci; 20:8... . » 19-6 
— Pea pk, eae 
Ei. 352 . . 37:5 
& . BE ae ay Oe 
It appears from these results that Apis prefers bee flowers, but also readily 
visits social flowers and flowers with concealed nectar, as well as, in the lowlands, 
flowers with half-concealed nectar. It follows, therefore, that the honey-bee occupies 
an intermediate position between long-tongued and short-tongued bees as regards 
its choice of flowers. The same thing is true of its colour predilections. 
Loew (‘Blumenbesuch von Insekten,’ I, pp. 6 et seq.) asserts that there is 
a double reason why the honey-bee takes the foremost place among insects which 
visit flowers, besides intelligence, in which it surpasses all its competitors. For 
the work of pollination the constantly increasing community of the beehive surpasses 
humble-bee societies and solitary bees, because it is able from the beginning of 
spring till late autumn to send forth at any time a great number of individuals 
well adapted to the requirements of flowers. No other bee can do this with the 
same continuity, There are, in addition, physical advantages apart from the special 
structure of the collecting and suctorial apparatus, by far the most important of 
these being the medium length (6 mm.) of the proboscis, It is true that greater 
elongation of this organ would render a number of humble-bee flowers accessible 
to the honey-bee, from which it can now only obtain nectar by biting a hole, 
but the possession of a longer proboscis would oblige it to give up visiting many 
flowers with nectar entirely or almost entirely exposed, for these cannot be con- 
veniently rifled by long-tongued visitors. Considering the honey-bee’s particularly 
large requirements in the matter of larval food, a proboscis of medium length would 
appear to be the best conceivable equipment for enabling it to take precedence 
of all competitors in regard to the number of flowers despoiled. 
Humble-bees also visit flowers of all classes, but greatly prefer humble-bee 
flowers, bee flowers, lepidopterid flowers, and conspicuous social flowers; to a 
M 2 
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