206 HANDBOOK OF NATURE STUDY 



There are three kinds of bees in each hive. A colony in 

 good condition contains one queen, from thirty to forty 

 thousand workers, and generally a small number of drones, 

 perhaps about a hundred. 



Function of the ivorkers. That bees gather the nectar, or 

 honey, from flowers by means of their sucking tongue, you 

 have often observed. This tongue is longer and can be 

 better seen in bumblebees than in the honeybee. If you 

 watch a bumblebee on a cool day, or late in the season, 

 you can best observe its work, because it is not so quick 

 then as on warm days. Bees prefer open flowers, such as 

 linden and buckwheat. In. flowers which, like the red 

 clover, form a deep tube, honeybees cannot reach the nec- 

 tar and must leave it for the longer lips, or tongues, of the 

 bumblebees. Can honeybees reach the nectar in white 

 clover ? The nectar is swallowed when gathered, and stored 

 in a honey sac within the bee's body. On coming home, 

 the bee drops it into a cell. But this is only the raw prod- 

 uct ; it is watery, and often has an unpleasant flavor and 

 odor. By the incessant buzzing of their wings, the bees 

 force currents of air through the hive, and by this draught 

 and the heat of their bodies evaporate the water in the 

 honey down to ten or twelve per cent. Sometimes the bees 

 keep up this buzzing all night. The unpleasant flavors and 

 odors are also more or less driven off, and formic acid, which 

 the bees can secrete by means of glands in their head, is 

 added to the honey as a preservative. After the honey is 

 thus fully ripened, and has been stored in cells near the 

 brood, each cell is sealed with a waxen cap. Ants also 

 secrete formic acid. Press your hand on a number of large 

 ants moving about on their pile, then raise your hand to 

 your nose and you will smell the formic acid. 



Gathering of pollen. We cannot see the honey with 

 which a bee is loaded on its home journey, but we have 



