96 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS 



ture whether, in the instance of the changed thistle growth, as the 

 sample grew in a pasture field where horses roamed, the abnormali- 

 ties had or had not been caused in that way. 



One of my acquaintances was lately speaking to me about the 

 unusual annoyance that he has lately suffered whilst ploughing up a 

 rough piece of land for winter wheat, that had become much infested 

 with colonies of humble-bees. These attacked and infuriated his 

 plough team, so that he was compelled to go to work and destroy 

 all the nests and exterminate the bees. Many of the nests he 

 described as being of the size of his two fists, and often containing 

 a pound or a pound and a half of pure honey. 



A young man, who was picking berries, about six weeks ago, 

 called my attention to several bees that had alighted on the edges of 

 the leaves of an elm tree that grew near the spot where we stood, 

 and under which some fine growths of Canadian golden rod were in 

 full blossom. Upon capturing several of the bees they made a loud, 

 angry buzzing, and assumed violently belligerent attitudes, but my 

 friend assured me that however unquakerish in disposition, these 

 bees had no stings, and that many children fearlessly handled them. 



I noticed that several of the bees were loaded with the rich 

 yellow colored pollen of the solidago flowers, and this fact seemed 

 to make dubious the proposition or rather supposition of my 

 informant that these individuals were drones or males of the humble- 

 bee perched on the leaves of the elm as an advantageous look-out 

 point for the queens of their species. 



A curious instance of Parasitism in a dual form came to my 

 notice twelve or sixteen days ago ; that is, if we are to class the" 

 birds of prey as parasitical on animal life in the lump. 



Here, close to our house, during the last of October, we were 

 troubled by predacious nocturnal visits from the large horned owl, 

 Strix Virginiana, to our hen roosts, so my son tried to capture some 

 of the marauders. A reliable steel trap was set on the summit of a 

 thin pole, erect and about thirty feet high, near the poultry roost, 

 and one dark night soon afterwards, or rather among the sma' hours 

 of the morning, a rather dolorous piece of bird minstrelsy smote 

 upon our ears and awakened us to the consciousness that our trap 



