THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



245 



Explanatory.— The figures before the 

 names indicate the number of years that the 

 person has kept bees. Those after, show 

 the number of colonies the writer had in the 

 previous spring and fall, or fall and spring, 

 as the time of the year may require. 



This mark © indicates that the apiarist is 

 located near the centre of the State named : 

 5 north of the centre ; ? south ; 0+ east ; 

 ♦Owest; and this 6 northeast; "^3 northwest; 

 o~ southeast; and P southwest of the centre 

 of the State mentioned. 



Offlcial Report of U. 8. Entomologist. 



Bees Ts, Fruit— ExDerifflents, 



N. w. m'lain. 



For the purpose of testing the capa- 

 city of bees, under exceptional cir- 

 cumstances, to injure fruit, I built a 

 house 16 feet long by 10 feet wide, and 

 8 feet high at the corners. Large 

 doors were hung in each end, and a 

 part of the siding on each side was 

 adapted to be raised up on hinges. 

 Screen doors were hung on the inside 

 of the outer doors, and wire cloth 

 covered the openings on the side 

 where the siding was raised. The 

 house is entirely bee-proof. When 

 the sides are raised up, and the outer 

 doors opened, the temperature and 

 light in the house is substantially the 

 same as outside. Along the sides of 

 the house I built shelves upon which 

 fruit was placed so that the rays of 

 the sun might strike the different 

 varieties in different stages of ripeness 

 from green to dead ripe. Plates of 

 ripe peaches, pears, plums, grapes, 

 &c., were placed on the shelves; 

 clusters of different kinds of grapes, 

 green and ripe, sound and imperfect, 

 and such as had been stung by insects, 

 were suspended from the rafters and 

 cross-ties of the house. 



On September 1, I removed three 

 colonies of bees from their hives, 

 carefully and quickly, so that they 

 would carry very little honey with 

 them when transferred from one hive 

 to another. Two of the colonies were 

 hybrid bees, and one Italian. These 

 colonies were hived on empty combs, 

 and placed in the house with the 

 fruit. A wood-stove was put in the 

 house, and for a number of hours 

 each day a high temperature was 

 maintained. The physical conditions 

 which would ordinarily prevail in 

 nature during a protracted and severe 

 drought were artificially produced .and 

 steadily maintained. 



The bees were brought to the 

 stages of hunger, thirst and starva- 

 tion. The house was kept locked, and 

 I carried the key. 



Every inducement and opportunity 

 was afforded the bees to satisfy their 

 hunger and thirst by attacking the 

 fruit exposed. They daily visited the 

 fruit in great numbers, and labored 

 diligently to improve the only remain- 

 ing source of subsistence. They 



hispected and took what advantage 

 they could of every opening at the 

 stem or crack in "the epidermis or 

 puncture made by insects which 

 deposit their eggs in the skin of 

 grapes. They regarded the epider- 

 mis of the peaches, pears, plums and 

 other fruits having a thick covering, 

 simply as subjects for inquiry and 

 investigation, and not objects for 

 attack. If the skin be broken or 

 removed they will, in case of need, 

 lap and suck the juices exposed. The 

 same was also true of the grapes if 

 the skin was broken by violence or 

 burst on account of the fruit becom- 

 ing overripe ; the bees lapped and 

 sucked the juices from the exposed 

 parts of grapes and stored it in the 

 cells forfood. They made no attempt 

 to grasp the cuticle of grapes with 

 their mandibles or with their claws. 

 If the grapes were cut open or burst 

 from overripeness the bees would lap 

 and suck the juice from the exposed 

 segments of the grape until they came 

 to the film separating the exposed and 

 broken segments from the unbroken 

 segments. Through and beyond the 

 film separating tlie segments they 

 appear to be unable to penetrate. I 

 removed the outer skin from many 

 grapes of different kinds, taking care 

 not to rupture the film surrounding 

 the pulp. When these were exposed 

 to the bees they continued to lap and 

 suck the juices from the outer film 

 until it was dry and smooth as was 

 the film between broken and unbrok- 

 en segments. They showed no dispo- 

 sition to use their jaws or claws, and 

 the outer film as well as the film 

 between broken segments remained 

 whole until the pulp decayed and 

 dried up. 



After continuing the test for thirty 

 days, using such varieties of fruit as 

 could be obtained, I sent to Michigan 

 for varieties not obtainable here. 

 Through the kindness and favor of 

 the president of the Michigan Horti- 

 cultural Society, Mr. T. T. Lyon, of 

 South Haven, Mich., I secured twenty 

 varieties of grapes, which arrived in 

 excellent condition. Another colony 

 of Italian bees was then placed in the 

 house with those ajready confined for 

 forty days, and the twenty varieties of 

 grapes were exposed upon plates and 

 suspended from the rafters as before. 

 The conditions naturally prevalent 

 during a severe and protracted drought 

 were again produced, and the test 

 again continued for twenty-five days. 

 The result was sinioly a repetition of 

 the former test. The bees showed no 

 more capacity or disposition to offer 

 violence to one variety of grapes than 

 another. No more attention was 

 given the thin-skinned varieties than 

 the thick-skinned. As long as the 

 skin remained whole they did not 

 harm the grapes. When the skins 

 were broken by violence, such as by 

 cutting or squeezing, the juices 

 exposed were appropriated. The 

 extent of damage the bees could do 

 to grapes burst from overripeness 

 depended on the extent of the rupture 

 in the film surrounding the pulp. A 

 wide rupture may be made in the 

 epidermis, or it may b'e removed, and 

 if the film is unbroken the pulp 



remained whWe. The film seldom 

 bursts until the grape is about to 

 decay, or has begun to decay, and 

 then the grape is of little value. 



In order to determine the size of the 

 opening necessary to be made in order 

 that bees might injure grapes, I 

 punctured the cuticle of the grapes in 

 several bunches with cambric needles 

 of various sizes. The puncture made 

 with the point of medium-sized needles 

 produced no effect. Neither does the 

 puncture made by the sting of insects, 

 when ovipositing, until the blister 

 appears and decay progresses with 

 the development of insect larvee. I 

 found that I might pass a medium 

 sized needle through a grape, from 

 side to side, and bees could obtain no 

 juice except that oozing from the 

 puncture. Many erroneously suppose 

 that bees sting the grapes. Bees 

 never sting except in self-defense or 

 in defense of their homes from real or 

 imaginary danger. 



At times when bees could gather 

 nothing in the fields I saturated clus- 

 ters of grapes with honey and sus- 

 pended them in front of the hives in 

 the apiary, and from branches of trees 

 and grape-vines near by. Other 

 clusters dipped in honey and syrup 

 were luing in the house. The bees 

 thronged upon the grapes until the 

 clusters looked like little swarms 

 hanging to the vines and limbs. They 

 lapped the grapes until the skins were 

 polished perfectly smooth and shining 

 like the inside skin of an onion, and 

 no taste of sweet could be detected by 

 touching the tongue to the grape. 

 The skins of the grapes were left 

 intact. 



Bees, like some animals of a higher 

 order, seem to enjoy stolen sweets 

 better than any other. Taking ad- 

 vantage of their propensity to steal 

 and despoil, I placed combs containing 

 honey in an unoccupied hive and 

 permitted the bees in the apiary to 

 steal the honey and such portions of 

 the comb as they could appropriate. 

 I then suspended instead of the 

 despoiled combs clusters of grapes 

 dipped in honey. The bees attacked 

 with desperate earnestness, apiiarent- 

 ly determined to literally go through 

 those grapes. The clusters were left 

 hanging for a day or two, until the 

 bees had entirely deserted the hive, 

 and examination showed the grapes 

 to be as sound as when placed there, 

 and the skins polished smooth and 

 clean as before. 



I then punctured the grapes of sev- 

 eral clusters by passing a darning- 

 needle through the berries from side 

 to side, and hung them in the house 

 near the hungry bees. They sucked 

 the juices from the broken segments 

 as far as they could insert their 

 tongues into the wound, leaving a 

 depression near the puncture, and the 

 remainder of the pulp was left whole. 



The instinct of bees impels them to 

 remove everything useless or strange 

 from their hive. They will labor 

 harder to remove any object which is 

 useless or offensive than for any other 

 purpose. After passing a darning- 

 needle through some of the grapes in 

 several clusters of different varieties, 

 I suspended these clusters from the 



