OR, MANUAL 01? THE APIARY. 91 



Strang-e as it may seem, the fecal pellets of some insects are 

 beautiful in form, and of others pleasant to the taste. These 

 fecal masses under trees or bushes often reveal the presence of 

 caterpillars. I find my children use them to excellent purpose 

 in finding- rare specimens. In some caterpillars they are 

 barrel-shaped, artistically fluted, of brilliant hue, and, if fos- 

 silized, would be greatly admired, as have been the coprolites — 

 fossil feces of higher animals — if set as gems in jewelry. As 

 it is, they would form no mean parlor ornament. In other 

 insects, as the Aphides, or plant-lice, the excrement, as well 

 as the fluid that escapes from the general surface of the body, 

 the anus, or in some species from special tubes called the 

 nectaries, is very sweet, and in absence of floral nectar will 

 often be appropriated by bees and conveyed to the hives. In 

 those insects that suck their food, as bees, butterflies, moths, 

 two-winged flies and bugs, the feces are liquid, while in case 

 of solid food the excrement is nearly solid. It is doubtless this 

 liquid excreta falling from bees that has been referred to often 

 as a fine mist. 



SBCRBTORY ORGANS OF INSECTS. 



I have already spoken of the salivary glands, which Kirby 

 describes as distinct from the true silk-secreting tubes, though 

 Newport thinks them one and the same. In many insects 

 these seem absent. I have also spoken of the mucus glands, 

 the urinary tubules, etc. Besides these, there are other secre- 

 tions which serve for purposes of defense. In the queen and 

 workers of bees, and in ants and wasps, the poison intruded 

 with the sting is an example. This is secreted by glands at 

 the posterior of the abdomen, stored in sacs (Fig. 38, pg], and 

 extruded through the sting as occasion requires. I know of no 

 insects that poison while they bite, except mosquitoes, gnats, 

 and some bugs. Mosquitoes and some flies, in biting, convey, 

 as do ticks, germs of malaria or noxious protozoans, and so 

 induce disease. 



A few exceedingly beautiful caterpillars are covered with 

 branching spines, which sting about like a nettle. We have 

 three such species. They are green, and of rare attraction, so 

 that to capture them is worth the slight inconvenience arising 



