PHYSIOLOGY OF THE HONEY BEE 



first place, it is not round like a tube, but is in 

 reality a flexible trough, the edges of which can 

 be brought together to enable the busy worker 

 to extract the last drop of nectar from the 

 yielding blossoms. 



By various experiments in breeding, the 

 tongue of some strains of bees has been 

 lengthened considerably, thus enabling them 

 to extract the nectar from the red clover, 

 whose corolla is so deep that its hidden sweets 

 are beyond the reach of the ordinary bee. 



The thorax is the intermediate part of the 

 body of the bee, and in it are located the organs 

 of locomotion, consisting of six legs and four 

 wings. The posterior legs are the most inter- 

 esting, as they have on them the little recepta- 

 cles for pollen in which the bees carry the pollen 

 from the flowers to their hives; sometimes 

 they are so heavily loaded as to be seriously 

 impeded in their flight. 



The honey sac is located in the abdomen, 

 and is a false or secondary stomach, and is the 

 vessel in which the bee carries the nectar from 



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