BEES 



APIS INDICA 



Tree Bee 



THE INDIAN BEES 



its wild state builds its combs exclusively more or less in the open that is 

 to say, on the undersides of the branches of large trees, in caves or under over- 

 Combs, hanging rocks, in buildings, etc." The combs are three to five feet long, and 

 two feet or more deep : they consist of cells that are 4J to the inch. Only oc- 

 casionally is a second comb built, side by side with the first. Some of these 

 combs weigh as much as a maund, and an average one gives from 10 to 20 Ib. of 

 honey and from 2 to 3 Ib. of wax. Mr. J. D. Douglas's note in the Dictionary (I.e. 435 ) 

 furnished the following reasons against the systematic cultivation of this species : 

 1. It builds naturally in the open. 2. It makes as a rule but one comb, so 

 that honey cannot be removed without destroying the brood. 3. Its comb though 

 large is not so great in cubic capacity as the combs of the ordinary domestic 

 bee of Europe (A. ineiiifri-f). 4. It is only met with in tropical countries. It 

 may be added that it is a vicious, intractable insect. 



Indian (ft) A. indica, Fabr. / Bingham (I.e. 558) ; the Indian SEMI-DOMESTICATED 



Semi- BEE : the HILL BEE ; the TREE BEE of Indian writers, or aathpuria, satha, 



Domesti- sateri, satpada, mohury, mohri, aira, ngap, yung, manchtilr, doar, doyer sadhi, 



cated satde, Icol, tudir-jen, aduku theni, thord egalu, pya aung, etc. 



Species. Habitat. Found throughout India and Burma and ascending the hills to 



9,000 feet. In the high altitudes of its area, such as Bhutan, Hazara, Kashmir, 



Khasia hills and Simla, the insect seems to become larger than when met with 



in the plains and lower hills. Unlike -*. dovnata it does not as a rule live 



in the open, but chooses hollow trees, overhanging eaves, crevices in walls, etc., 



and shows a preference for proximity to human dwellings rather than for the 



Combs. hearts of forests or the faces of inaccessible rocks. There are several combs, one 



above the other, hence the name sathpuria or seven-layered. The cells are about 



Yield. 5 to 6 to the inch. The yield of honey from a fair-sized hive would be from 



10 to 40 Ib., and of wax from 2 to 10 Ib. 



Domestication Mr. G. Minniken. in a report published in the Dictionary (iv., 268), gives 



in Temperate an interesting account of the degree of domestication practised on the 

 ' Himalaya, and that may be here epitomised since it is fairly representative 



of the bee-culture of India. In Beshahr, he says, houses one, two or three 

 stories high are often specially kept for rearing bees. In these, small recesses 

 are made in the walls, two feet apart and closed on the outside by a wooden 

 panel in which an entrance hole is made. A man is usually in charge of each 

 such bee-house, whose duty it is to prevent over-swarming. This is effected 

 by giving each colony ample room, and sometimes by clipping the wings of the 

 queen. He has also to keep the apiary well stocked with early swarms, and 

 to guard it against the rapacity of bears, martens, hornets, caterpillars, etc. 

 Stocking is most generally effected by capturing wild swarms and bringing 

 these to the apiary. But where bee-culture on a large scale is not contemplated, 

 it is customary for the hill people to provide one or two recesses in the walls of 

 the ordinary dwelling-houses in which a few swarms may be reared. In the 

 Simla district it is believed the best honey is procured in localities where 

 Piecti-anthtiB ftigostis (the pekh) abounds. 



The Bashahr system is followed in Chamba, Hazara, Jhelum, Kangra and 

 Kullu. Swarms are looked for in the jungles, and carried off to the zamindar's 

 Kashmir Bee. house. In Kashmir, a honey-bee manchtilr is almost completely domesticated, 

 and seems to be a variety of A. imitcti hardly separable from A., infin/em. In 

 the Khasia hills a somewhat similar semi-domestication exists, the swarms being 

 captured in the jungles and kept in small boxes under the eaves of the houses. 

 Smallest (c) A. florea, Fabr. / Bingham (I.e. 559). This is the smallest of the three 



Indian Bee. Indian bees, but with A. iuatca is much more closely allied to the European 

 lioney-bee (A., weiiifern) than to the Indian rock bee (A., dorsatn). 



Habitat. It has been collected in Bengal, Assam, Burma, Madras, Malabar, 



Central Provinces, Central India, the United Provinces and on the Himalaya 



from Kumaon and Sikkim. It might in fact be viewed as a slightly more 



isemi-tropical tropical species which displaces to a large extent the western and northern A.. 



Species. . intlicn. It has been called FLOWER BEE by some writers, and appears to be the 



kdtydl, lamai, tudbi, zinya, kol-jen, kom-buthem, thodi-pera, pullu-egalu or pulla- 



Combs. tenai-egalu, yin-pya, etc., etc. Its combs consist of cells that are nine to the inch. 



It would appear frequently to build in the open a single comb suspended from 



branches of trees or rather thorny bushes, especially near river-banks, but 



sometimes it selects cavities in walls or hollow trees, or builds under the cornices 



or other protecting parts of houses. It is a comparatively harmless insect, 



and about the size of the domestic fly. It is probable that the mohri or 



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