The Nervous System and the Senses 177 



and perhaps this is a function of some of the problematical 

 organs on the antennae. 



Finding of the flowers. 



In a previous chapter (p. 118), a discussion is given of 

 the division of labor whereby bees are seemingly able to 

 apportion the available forage to prevent duplication. In 

 this connection the interesting question arises as to how the 

 bees find the flowers. Considerable detailed and painstaking 

 work has been done on this subject. Plateau l and his 

 followers on the one hand believe that bees are guided to the 

 nectar by odor, this being supported by experimental evi- 

 dence as well as by an array of facts concerning the gathering 

 of nectar from inconspicuous flowers. Forel 2 and other 

 writers assert, on the contrary, that color is the important 

 stimulus and that flowers are found through the sense of 

 sight. Plateau's work is open to one important criticism, 

 since he overlooks the possibility of the return of bees to his 

 mutilated flowers through memory. Burton N. Gates, 

 several years ago, showed that bees visit artificial flowers 

 and also fly to natural flowers which have been sealed in 

 glass tubes. The reaction to these unusual objects was 

 entirely normal. These results point strongly to the belief 

 that odor is of minor importance in the location of nectar- 



1 Plateau, Felix, 1895-97. Comment les fleurs attirent les insects. Bui. 

 acad. roy. d. Belgique, 3 ser., XXX, n. 11, XXXII, n. 11, XXXIII, n. 1, 

 XXXIV, n . 9, 10, 11. See also Plateau, 1888. Recherches experimen tales 

 sur la vision chez les arthropodes, ibid., part. 3-5 and other papers. 



2 Forel, Auguste, 1886-88. Recueil zoologiques Suisse, 1 ser., IV. 

 , 1908. The senses of insects. Eng. trans. Yearsley. London : 



Methuen and Co., 324 pp. 



See also: Andreae, Eug., 1903. Inwiefern werden Insekten durch Fabre 

 und Duft der Blumen angezogen. Beihefte z. Bot. Centralbl., XV. 



Giltay, E., 1901. Ueber die Bedeutung der Krone bei den Bliiten und 

 tiber das Farbenunterscheidungs vermogen der Insekten, I. Pringh. Jahrb. 

 f. wiss. Bot., XL. 



Detto, Carl, 1905. Blutenbiologische Untersuchungen I u. II. Flora 

 odor Allg. bot. Zeit., XCIV. 



Kienitz-Gerloff, 1898 u. 1903. Proffessor Plateau und die Blumentheorie 

 I u. II. Biol. Centralbl., XVIII u. XXIII. 



