SECTION VII 

 Garden Friends 



Although the gardener may look upon the great majority of insects 

 as enemies, he must not conclude that there are no friends of his in 

 the insect world. There are several, and it may be well to put them 

 on record here. 



In the first place the honey bee (Apis mellifica) does an enormous 

 amount of good to the fruit-grower by fertilizing the pistils in the flowers 

 of his Apple, Pear, Plum, Cherry and other fruit crops, thus ensuring 

 a bounteous harvest, if the spring frosts have not interfered with the 

 process of fertilization at a 

 critical period. Whenever the 

 fruit-grower can manage to have 

 a few hives of bees in his gardens 

 he will find it advantageous from 

 a commercial point of view, and 

 apart from the quantities of 

 honey he may take from the 

 hives for his own use or for sale. 

 Bees, of course, are not only 

 valuable for securing the fertil- 

 ization of fruit trees and bushes 

 of all kinds, but they perform 

 similar good offices for almost 



every flowering plant. In a lesser degree the Humble Bees (Bombus ter- 

 restris and R lucorum) also do good work in fertilizing flowers, but they 

 are often charged with taking a short cut to obtain the nectar by piercing 

 the base of the flowers of Broad Beans and Runner Beans, instead of 

 entering by the mouth of the blossoms and thus secure the deposition 

 of the pollen from their bodies on to the stigmas. 



Ladybirds. There are over twenty species of these known in Britain, 

 but two especially are very common in gardens, viz. Coccinella (or Adalia} 

 bipunctata and 0, septempunctata. The first-named (fig. 154, 7), is black 

 with scarlet wing cases, and two conspicuous black spots; the second (C. 

 septempunctata) is larger (fig. 154, 9) and has seven black spots on the 



197 



Fig. 154. Ladybirds 



1, Eggs, natural size, on a leaf. 2, Egg magnified. 3, 

 Larva, with the line 4 showing natural size. 5 and 6, Pupae. 

 7, Coccinella bipunctata. 8, C. dispar. 9, C. septempunctata. 



