DISEASES AND ENEMIES OF BEES 



dwindled one, queen, bees, combs, and all, 

 and when it has built up to fair strength, put 

 it back on its stand. 



There are a number of enemies that prey 

 upon the bees, and as some of them are hard 

 to reach, and as the results of their predations 

 are minor, it is one of the phases of bee-keeping 

 where the beekeeper has to take a chance, as it 

 were. There are certain insectivorous birds 

 that catch and eat bees while in flight, and 

 many a good virgin queen in her matrimonial 

 flight has been gobbled up, but this is a chance 

 we have to take, and I know no means of 

 stopping it. In warm climates the dragon 

 flies kill a large number of virgin queens when 

 in flight, and in certain sections they are so 

 numerous that commercial queen-rearing is 

 well nigh an impossibility. 



Frogs will often in the cool of the evening 

 place themselves at the entrance of a hive of 

 bees, and many a luckless bee has been en- 

 snared in their long tongues to make a tasty 

 morsel for them. Field mice and small 



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