THE AMERICA^^ BEE JOURNAL. 



THE WINGS OP THE BEE. 



Physiologically Considered as Organs of 

 " Flight and of Special Sensation. 



The foUowiui;- paper avjis vctul before the 

 Bee-keeper.s' Convention, by Gen. Adair : 



To the novice the wings of a bee appear 

 as a dry membrane or tissue of skin,stretch- 

 ed over a frame-work of as equally dry and 

 lifeless ribs of hard, elastic, horny matter. 

 He does not suspect that they have other 

 than to enable the bees to fly, or that their 

 loss or destruction does other injur}" than 

 to disable them from flight. It is a com- 

 mon practice even among well informed 

 apiarians to cut oft" the wings ol' the queen 

 to prevent her going oft' with a swarm. 

 A better acquaintance with the structure 

 and uses of the wings would show that any 

 such mutilation must be injurious. 



Bees do not breathe through the mouth, 

 neither do they have lungs, like the high- 

 er animals. Respiration is ' carried on 

 throup-h an intricate ramification of minute 

 tubes called trachea, having their outlets 

 or mouths as pores (called spiracles or 

 stigmata) in the sidesof their bodies, under 

 and behind their wings. Through these 

 breathing pores the air is led by those 

 delicate tubes to every part of the body, 

 even to the tips of their wings. 



Bees have no heart as higher animals 

 have. A tube, or as it is called, a " dorsal 

 vessel," lying just beneath the middle line 

 of the back, and extending from the head 

 to the tip of the abdomen, performs that 

 ofiice. The blood is received into this tiibe, 

 and, as bees have no veins proper, it es- 

 capes from all jDarts of the tube and tra- 

 verses the bod}' in currents, bathing all the 

 organs, even to the extremities of the 

 wings. 



The nervous system of bees consists of 

 a cord, or rather a double cord, commenc- 

 ing in a knot in the head, which is their 

 so-called brain ; from thence it extends 

 throughout the whole length of the body 

 under all the internal organs, resting on 

 the "floor" of the body-walls. On' this 

 cord, at intervals, there ai'e swellings 

 (ganglia) from which fine filaments are 

 sent out, which are special nerves for the 

 various organs to which they lead ; one 

 branch passing to the wings is distributed 

 through all parts of them. 



The horny frame upon which the fine 

 meml)raue of the wings is stretched, is all 

 of it coniposed of hollow tubes of a hard 

 substance called chitine (the same sub- 

 stance that constitutes the hard ])art of 

 the organs and the crust of all insects). 

 Those tubes are double, being one tube 

 inside ol another. The inner ones are 

 extensions of the trachea through which 

 the air circulates in breathing ; between 

 which and the other is a space through 

 which the blood circulates, and is brought 

 in contact with the air through the thin 

 walls of the air tubes, just as the air and 

 blood are brought together in the human 

 lungs, and M^ith the same eftect. 



Thus we see that the wings, besides be- 

 ing organs of flight, are in reality lungs. 

 The blood in the wings, however, is not 

 confined to those tubes, but circulates like 

 the sap in the leaves of plants to all parts 

 of them, and, it is likely, is thus also 

 aerated. 



The nervous filaments we have also seen 

 pass to the wings. They follow these 

 tubes, and all the fine venations, and ter- 

 minate in every part of the wings in what 

 are called nerve filaments (papilla?), which 

 in all animals are, vehicles through which 

 all sensations are perceived ; so that we 

 may infer that the wings of bees, besides 

 giving the power of flying and acting as 

 lungs, are also organs of sensation of some 

 kind. All parts of the human body have 

 these nerve filaments on the surface, 

 through which the sense of touch is exer- 

 cised. The eye has them so modified that 

 they give us sight. On the tongue they 

 give us taste ; in the nose, smell, and in the 

 ear, hearing — in each case modified to give 

 dift'erent perceptions. For what purpose 

 the wings of bees are so supplied has not 

 been determined. We would of course 

 conclude that the wina;s were not oro-ans 

 of sight or taste. 



In all the investigations of naturalists 

 none of them have been able to locate the 

 organ of smell, although the belief is that 

 it is the most poAverful of all their senses 

 and the most necessary to them in search- 

 ing for hone}'. By means of it, it is sup- 

 posed that they recognize each other and 

 distinguish between their tellows and 

 strangers to the colony. Some have sug- 

 gested the antennae as the organs of smell, 

 but as they appear to be poorly adapted 

 to perform such an oflSco, it is just about 



