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 treeis 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 
