669. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



menced some investigations, which 

 though less extensive and complete than 

 I should like, and less so than the im- 

 portance of the subject demands, are as 

 much so as the time at my command 

 would permit. Some of the experiments, 

 indeed we may say all of them, are yet 

 in progress. 



Among deciduous fruits I have experi- 

 mented on plums, cherries, apricots and 

 pears. I am also investigating the pol- 

 lination of the orange and lemon among 

 citrus fruits. As yet I can only report 

 on the deciduous fruits, and of these the 

 report will be but partial. 



The experiments were conducted in 

 much the same manner as in Michigan, 

 only inevery case I put bees in one of 

 the sacks surrounding the blossoms, and 

 in one experiment with the plum I re- 

 moved one sack when the bees were 

 working in force on the tree, and marked 

 the blossoms on which I saw the bees 

 alight; covering all up again as soon as 

 I ceased watching them. I caught some 

 of the bees and examined them with a 

 lens, and found their heads, legs and 

 bodies well dusted with the pollen. A 

 similar examination of the flowers 

 showed that they had received pollen 

 from the visiting bees. The number of 

 blossoms in each experiment varied from 

 32 to over 100. 



As soon as the blossoms withered I 

 removed the covers, and a week later 

 found what seemed healthy developing 

 fruit in abundance on all the twigs. 

 Thus we see that any lack as the result 

 of close-pollination does not show at 

 once. Last Friday I examined all the 

 twigs. The plums — two different trees 

 in different orchards — the cherry and 

 the pears (two trees) show not a single 

 fruit on the twigs from which all bees 

 were excluded, while those covered with 

 sacks in which bees were put, give on 

 plum in one case three, in the other five; 

 the cherry five ; and the pear six and 

 eight, respectively. The limbs uncov- 

 ered from the same number of blossoms 

 give eight and five on plum ; the cherry 

 seven ; and the pear eight and eleven. 



It will be observed thatonly from one- 

 fourth to one-twentieth of the blossoms 

 under observation have developed fruit. 

 You all know that this is always so. The 

 blossoms are in clusters of five, more or 

 less, while the fruit, if we except crab- 

 apples, is usually single. In case of 

 oranges, how very few of the blossoms 

 come to fruit. 



It is a curious and suggestive fact that 

 all of the four covered blossoms that I 

 actually saw the bees visit while uncov- 

 ered and under observation, have up to 



this date large, fine plums. The apricot 

 tree is a curious exception. The num- 

 ber of blossoms on each twig under ex- 

 periment was 32. The twig covered all 

 the time of bloom showed, last Friday, 

 ten fine apricots. The one where I put 

 the bees inside the sack, six ; and the 

 one uncovered, only five. Here the cover 

 would seem to have been an advantage, 

 but we can hardly see how this could be 

 true. It seems certain that this variety 

 of apricot at least does not require cross- 

 pollination. 



Another fact observed makes these 

 experiments all the more interesting. I 

 saw many thrips on all the blossoms, es- 

 pecially on the oranges where I saw ten 

 at one time on a single blossom. These 

 minute insects would almost surely have 

 carried the pollen from the anther to 

 the stigma of every blossom, and without 

 doubt in some cases from the anther of 

 one flower to the stigma of another close 

 by. Yet all the blossoms to which no 

 bees had access, if we except those of 

 the apricot, failed to develop, and were 

 presumably non-pollinated. This seems 

 to demonstrate. Or at least strongly in- 

 dicates, that these fruits require cross- 

 pollination, and that some agency is re- 

 quired to accomplish it. 



As already stated, I am not ready to 

 report on the orange. Several of my 

 students and myself are experimenting 

 with orange-blossoms. The pollen is 

 applied artificially by hand, and each 

 stigma receives exclusively either the 

 pollen from its own blossom, or that 

 from other blossoms on the same tree, 

 or that from other trees of the same 

 variety, or again that from blossoms of 

 other varieties. We are waiting results 

 with great interest. It is a pretty well 

 settled law that nectar, showy blossoms 

 and fragrance in bloom, are all indica- 

 tions of the necessity of cross-pollina- 

 tion, and are so many invitations to the 

 nectar-loving insects to come to the aid 

 of the needy and waiting blossoms. In 

 this view we should expect to find the 

 orange one of the most dependent of 

 fruits — one that without the aid of bees 

 and other sweet-loving insects would be 

 barren and unfruitful. It goes without 

 saying that the settlement of this ques- 

 tion experimentally is of great moment 

 to Southern California. 



(Concluded next week.) 



A Binder for holding a year's num- 

 bers of the Bee Journal we mail for 

 only 50 cents ; or clubbed with the 

 Journal for $1.40. 



