FARM ANIMALS 407 



come from the Old World, and has been well able to 

 take care of itself. "Bee trees" containing wild honey 

 are found all over the United States, their hollows 

 having been filled with honeycomb by swarms escaped 

 from hives kept on farms or bee ranches. In California 

 they have often taken possession of courthouse and 

 other cupolas, from which the honey finally ran down 

 into the offices. It has sometimes been very difficult 

 to get rid of them, as a very small hole is enough to let 

 them in and out. They also build in caves in rocky 

 banks, from which the honeycombs have to be mined. 



Bees visit all kinds of flowers to get honey from 

 the honey glands inside the petals, as well as pollen for 

 feeding the young bees, which they gather in bunches 

 on their hairy legs. They also scrape off the sticky 

 covering of buckeye, cottonwood, and other buds for 

 use as glue to fasten the honeycombs. 



They will also take any sweets they can find, such 

 as the honeydew secreted by plant lice, and sweet 

 fruit juices of all kinds. But it is a mistake to suppose 

 that they ever wound a fruit in order to suck the juice, 

 for honeybees have no jaws with which to break the 

 skin even of an apple. They only suck the wounds 

 already made by some biting insect or bird, and then 

 enlarge them. They are of great use to the orchardist 

 in the carrying of pollen to blooming trees that other- 

 wise would set no fruit (page 93). 



All this work is done by the worker bees. These are 



