INSECT INTRUDERS. 



is the future home of the grub which 

 will hatch out from the egg and the 

 pollen forms the store of food provided 

 for it. By the time this store is ex- 

 hausted, the grub will have become full 

 grown and will pupate, to issue as a 

 bee the following season. One tunnel 

 may contain five or six of such cells 

 end to end, each lined and capped, and 

 containing a portion of pollen and an 

 egg. The mouth of the tunnel is finally 

 closed with a little mud, when the work 

 of house-building and egg-laying will 

 be complete. 



The reason for lining the tunnel with 

 moist green leaves is to prevent the food 

 with which it is provided pollen brought 

 from the flowers in the garden from 

 being absorbed or from drying up too 

 quickly. That insects should have reached 

 this knowledge and have developed an 

 instinct enabling them to counteract this 

 drawback is wonderful, but the precision 

 and dexterity of the leaf-cutting business 

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