INTRODUCTION 7 



and even then the work of collecting it would be 

 laborious. 



The tongue of the humble-bee is much longer 

 than that of the honey-bee, consequently she can 

 extract honey from flowers having long narrow 

 tubes, such as red clover, honeysuckle, and hore- 

 hound, which are seldom or never visited by 

 honey-bees. As a rule these flowers are very 

 melliferous. Indeed, the heads of the red clover 

 contain more honey than almost any other flower, a 

 fact appreciated by children, who pull out the tubes 

 and suck them. Humble-bees have almost a mono- 

 poly of the vast amount of honey that is produced 

 in a red clover field, but there are not enough of 

 them to gather much of it. 



Nevertheless humble-bees are extremely valu- 

 able for fertilising the numerous flowers that they 

 frequent. Whole groups of plants bearing long- 

 tubed flowers, including many species valuable to 

 man, depend chiefly upon humble-bees for their 

 propagation. Charles Darwin, in the Origin of 

 Species, said ; " I find from experiment that humble- 

 bees are almost indispensable to the fertilisation of 

 the heartsease ( Viola tricolor), for other bees do not 

 visit this flower." In consequence of the absence 

 of humble-bees in New Zealand it was found that 

 the red clover did not produce seed freely. So 

 in November and December 1884 a number of 

 queens were sent from England to that country, 

 with the result that two species, B. terrestris and 

 B. ruderatus, have become established there, and 



