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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Lecture on Practical Botany. 



We feel confident our readers all 

 take a deep interest in everything re- 

 lating to botany and entomology, so tar 

 as they are directly connected with 

 bee-keeping. Dr. J. R. Baker, of 

 Keithsburg, 111., sent us two speci- 

 mens, which Prof. Burrill describes 

 below in his very instructive manner. 

 One specimen has been the cause of 

 much annoyance, on account of wax- 

 ing up the feet of the worker bees : 



I send two varieties of plants that are 

 indigenous to this locality and give 

 the names of both, if you please. In 

 our ignorance here we call the one 

 with the red bloom white root, or 

 pleurisy root, but I don't know really 

 what it is. The bees work on the 

 bloom (which is very profuse) very 

 eagerly, and seem to get honey from 

 it freely. The flowers are beautiful, 

 and if it is a good honey plant it 

 would pay to cultivate it. It grows 

 from 20 to SOincheshigh, and is nicely 

 grouped, a great many stocks spring- 

 ing from one base. The other speci- 

 men which I send is not yet in bloom, 

 but it bears a yellow flower, on which 

 the bees work very industriously in 

 the early part of the tlay. The plant 

 only grows from 6 inches to a foot in 

 height, and the leaf looks like that of 

 the locust. The sandmint or bee- 

 mint, etc., of which I made mention 

 recently in the Bee Journal, I see 

 Prof. Cook calls Monarda fistulosa. 

 Your book entitled " Bees and 

 Honey,'' is a magnificent little work. 

 I have Prof. Cook's and A. I. Root's 

 books, and I like them both very 

 much, still I find much pleasure and 

 profit in reading your " Bees and 

 Honey." Every beginner in bee- 

 keeping ought to have your book and 

 it will do the veterans in the ranks 

 good, too, I am sure. 



No. 1. Aaclepias tuberosa, butterfly 

 weed or pleurisy root. This hand- 

 some plant, common in fields (hedge- 

 rows, etc.), meadows, and waste 

 places with its leafy stem and con- 

 spicuous clusters of reddish-orange 

 flowers, the latter appearing through- 

 out the latter half of summer, cer- 

 tainly deserves attention. It is a 

 beautiful thing seen at a distance, 

 and its curiously contrived flowers 

 merit the closest inspection and most 

 careful interpretation. Bee-keepers, 

 however, should observe another 

 thing connected with the plant. There 

 is a good supply of nectar, and bees 

 are not slow to find it out, but many 

 of them pay dearly for their booty. 

 The pollen is lodged in cells with ex- 

 ternal slits, and collected small pear- 

 shaped stalked masses, which are 

 quite viscid or sticky. To reach the 

 nectar the bee must press against the 

 parts containing these waxy pollen 

 masses, and are almost sure to with- 



draw them adhering to the insect's 

 body. Not unfrequently the feet be- 

 come clogged with the amount of the 

 viscid material from which extrica- 

 tion is impossible. The poor honey 

 gatherer dropping upon the ground or 

 lodging among the grass, struggles in 

 vain for freedom, and dies for want of 

 it. My observations, however, have 

 not been full enough to warrant any 

 statement of the real danger to which 

 a colony of bees are thus exposed 

 where the plant abounds. If I mis- 

 take not, the subject has been pretty 

 well written up by some one. 



No. 2. Cassia charamcrista. partridge 

 pea, wild sensitive plant. This com- 

 mon, yellow flowered plant is often 

 very abundant in rather low grounds. 

 The leaves are considerably alike 

 those of its relative, the sensitive 

 plant of the green-houses, and are 

 slowly sensitive to touch. The flow- 

 ers are very attractive to honey-loving 

 insects, and are visited often in great 

 numbers. At the base of each com- 

 pound leaf there is a curious-stalked, 

 button-shaped gland, which also ex- 

 cretes a sweet fluid and which, there- 

 fore, attracts bees and wasps. What 

 is this for ? It is well understood 

 that the nectar of the flower serves to 

 secure the aid of insects in carrying 

 pollen, and so favors cross-fertiliza- 

 tion, but what advantage can it be to 

 the plant to manufacture and exude 

 the enticing substance far from the 

 flower? From some observations 

 made years ago, I think a possible ex 

 planation is offered. Will others 

 seek to disprove or corroborate. It is 

 manifestly injurious to the plant if 

 cross-fertilization is a benefit, to have 

 the nectar of the flower stolen by 

 creeping insects, for they cannot 

 readily pass from plant to plant. Now, 

 if any such ascend the stem, these lit- 

 tle stores from the leaf glands would 

 be sure to receive attention, and thus 

 the flower be more likely to escape. 

 That ants do thus turn aside I have 

 frequently seen ; but something more. 

 Wasps, during fair weather, are 

 almost constantly busy about these 

 leaf glands, and they appear to do 

 yeoman service in keeping down all 

 sorts of creeping things. What in- 

 tricacy of plan, what marvellous 

 adaptation of means to end ! 



Drones and their Worlt. 



Hon. G. W. Demaree, with his 

 proverbial candor and usual ability, 

 on page 472 treats of " queens, drones 

 and workers," and " assumes when a 

 proposition has long been accepted as 

 a ' fact,' the burden of proof rests on 

 the shoulders of those who wisli to 

 controvert and overthrow it." We 

 have long had a doubt whether the 

 poor drone has had full justice done 

 it, but have only expressed a doubt, 

 and gave our reasons for entertaining 

 it. Had we known that our doubts 

 were susceptible of being converted 

 into accepted " facts " at the present 

 time, we should have arrayed our 

 proof as frankly as we intimated a 

 doubt. 



The first and third of Mr. De- 

 maree's propositions we are not dis- 

 posed to controvert at the present 

 time, although we should not hesitate 

 to do so if we thought they were 

 founded on error. 



We think, however, our correspond- 

 ent is in error in saying no one colony 

 will tolerate more than one queen, 

 but the exceptions are so rare as to 

 most fully establish the rule ; and yet 

 the very colony in which the intrusive 

 queen might be soonest killed, will 

 perhaps be the one to tolerate most 

 drones. It is notorious, that bees are 

 usually most prosperous when the 

 drones are most plentiful, and it is 

 possible that each contingency is to 

 an extent dependent on the other. It 

 is not proof that drones perform but 

 the one single function, because tra- 

 dition or theory accredits them with 

 but one, or because we have no means 

 of arriving at present at their specific 

 work. 



During two days of last week very 

 industriously employed in assisting to 

 extract, it was a noticeable fact that 

 the colonies wherein the most drones 

 were peacefully harbored, were in no 

 wise deficient in quantity of honey, 

 nor in its ripeness and quality. 



^ Dr. J. P. H.Brown, of Augusta, 

 Ga.. writes thus: "We are having 

 a delightful season— plenty of honey 

 and lots of fruit. The crops are very 

 fine and agriculturists ought to feel 

 happy." 



1^ Mr. Ellas Clouse, who has been 

 elected secretary and treasurer of a 

 new Canadian Bee-Keepers' Society, 

 organized on Jan. 13, 1S82, writes us 

 that though they have had but 4 

 meetings, the members now number 

 40. This is a good beginning for tlie 

 " Norfolk Bee-Keepers' Association," 

 and promises good results. The next 

 meeting will be held at Simcoe, On- 

 tario, on Friday, August 4, 1882, at 2 

 p. m. 



