822 GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. July 1 



;according to Bethe, within a distance of three kilometers. Because, when let go, these 

 tees found their way home just as well as those from the meadow, he decides that "there 

 can be no doubt at all that bees find their way back to the hive, not by means of memory 

 pictures" (Bethe, p. 89). 



I cannot find in the foregoing the slightest foundation for this view of Bethe's. If 

 he wishes to disprove the investigations of Romanes,"' then I think the attempt is unsuc- 

 cessful, for Bethe leaves to us the proving that the city has remained actually "unknown" 

 -to the bees." 



But how is the mysterious behavior in the streets explained? We shall let Bethe 

 speak for himself: "All bees, if let fly, go upward in a corkscrew line, then suddenly 

 take a direction and fly off in a straight line. This happens when bees are let fly in the 

 city streets almost always before they have reached the levels of the house roofs. It often 

 happens at a height of four to six meters above the street level, therefore generally before 

 they can have acquired a view of the neighborhood. Now, almost without exception, they 

 take the direction of the Institute, where the hives are." 



Before I give the explanation for this, other parts of Bethe's account continue : "Light 

 ■is the incentive to flight in these diurnal animals" (Bethe, p. 83) ; further, "Light regulates 

 flight." 



I remember, too, in Herm. Miiller's investigations that he could carry a bee in a 

 drinking-glass, open beneath, the length of the garden without the bee flying out, for it 

 •constantly pressed to the top of the glass toward the light.°° 



I slipped a bee into a reagent glass and put it upon the window-sill so that the 

 •bottom of the glass was toward the window. For eight hours the bee strove inside 

 ■the glass in vain efforts to reach the light. Then it died, although it would have been 

 easy to crawl out of the open tube and fly out of the open window. 



Now, if we remember that the city lies to the north of the seat of Bethe's investi- 

 gations, we shall see that the sun must be in the direction of the Institute, and the 

 bees were let fly in "quiet, sunny weather" (Bethe, p. 87). In the darker streets, perhaps 

 unknown! to them, they tried to orient themselves by mounting in circles, just as a 

 carrier pigeon does.'"' Then they fly instinctively toward the bright source of light (just 

 .as in a room they fly unfailingly toward the bright window) until they became oriented 

 -in familiar regions. "Light regulates flight" (Bethe, p. 83). 



I, therefore, can not consider the "unknown force" and the conclusions based on 

 -it as capable of proof. 



I have held to Bethe's assertions with regard to these directions. From them I 

 understand that on one side of the Institute toward the south are the meadows ; and on 

 the other (therefore toward the north) is the city. Possibly Bethe did not liberate 

 -the bees just in the center of the city but toward the edge, so that the Institute was 

 shifted from its southern position a little toward the west or east. Further investiga- 

 tions might be necessary, perhaps, to prove that these bees did not return to the hive 

 ■not through the "unknown force." 



We learn from Bethe (1. c, p. 87) that eight marked bees were let fly in the city 



»^ Romanes, Nature, 1885, Vol. 32, p. 630, Homing Faculties of Hymenoptera. 



®* That Bethe's idea that bees had not been flying in the city is not at all convincing, ..jllows from 

 something written by the editor of "Elsass-Lothring. Bienenziichters," Karl Zwillinp, which reached 

 me subsequently. In my publication in the "Biologischen Centralblatt" the same is given, therefore, in 

 a later passage. I quote the following: "* * * Outside of Strassburg there are many apiaries close 

 to the wall, the bees of which never think of flying into the city except in times when there is no 

 forage. Then they enter the candy factory of Mr. Pale, Tiergarten Strasse, and annoy the workers as 

 well as partake of the sweets. Even in the month of December, 1899, in the warm sunshine I observed 

 bees flying in the middle of the city on the Kleberplatz, where hundreds of pots of flowers were dis- 

 played for sale. There they gathered honey and pollen. Every year some swarms fly into Strassburg 

 and hang on the chestnut, linden, oak, and locust trees found in many parts of the city, and once a 

 swarm hung on the showcases of a glove-store near the cathedral. When the trees bloom, bees fly 

 about them vigorously. In the interior of the city there are beautiful rows of chestnuts along the 111, 

 rows of lindens around the Kleberplatz, etc., all of which are sought out by the bees when they are in 

 t>Ioom. The honey-venders and those who deal in sugar wares are not molested if they keep their wares 

 .covered. As I live in the neighborhood of Strassburg (ten minutes by rail), and have been President 

 -■of the Bienenverein there for thirty years, I know the conditions exactly." 



" Herm. Miiller, Versuche iiber die Farbenliebhaberei der Honigbiene, Kosmos, Tahrg. 6, p. 276, 1882. 



•• H. E. Ziegler, Die Geschwindigkeit der Brieftauben, Zoolog. Jahrb., X. Bd., 1897, pp. 99, 278. 



