XXX. WHAT GOES ON IN THE APPLE BLOSSOMS 



"Around old homesteads clustering thick they shed 

 Their sweets to murm'ring bees; 

 And o'er hushed lanes and wayside fountains spread 

 Their pictured canopies." 



— Horatio H. Powers (Apple Blossoms) 



Sweet is the scent of the orchard in May. When the apple 

 trees array themselves in pink and white it is the time of a 

 great annual festival. The apple tree is host. In every one 

 of its florets a place is spread for a little winged guest. The 

 food is nectar and pollen, provided in lavish abundance. A 

 brilliant company of bees and flies and butterflies are guests. 

 The merry activity runs for days together, heightening when 

 the sun shines brightly. It is held at the opening of the 

 summer season, and the serious work of producing an apple 

 crop is dependent on the good will and patronage of these 

 visiting insects. 



For, not all the pollen is eaten by them. Some of it is 

 carried on their bodies and implanted on the stigmas of the 

 flowers, where its growth results in the fertilization of the 

 ovules ; this conditions the development of fruit. To secure 

 this service, which the insects render unwittingly while satis- 

 fying their own appetites, the apple tree advertises its feast 

 by fringing each flower with a circlet of pink and white petals, 

 hung out gaily like banners, and sets a green dish in the center 

 filled with drops of fragrant nectar, which perfumes the pass- 

 ing breeze. It also provides pollen greatly in excess of its 

 own needs and offers great bursting anthers full of it. Then 

 the bees come. 



A honey-bee alights on the edge of a flower with her hind 

 feet clutching the petals and her head thrust in among the 

 stamens. She would like nectar; so she unslings her long 



213 



