12 



Texas Depaetment op Agriculture. 



sects because they appear in larger numbers, especially early in the 

 season, and their greater activity makes them more useful in the 

 great work they help to perform. It is estimated that the value of 

 honey bees as pollen distributors is far greater to our country than 

 the value of the crops of honey produced. We owe it to honey bees 

 that we have larger quantity and better quality of fine fruit, vegeta- 

 ble and cereal crops than we would otherwise have. Of this there is 

 not the least doubt. Since honey bees are general pollen gatherers, 

 appear in greater numbers, visit a far larger number of blossoms over 

 a greater territory, and do this more thoroughly than any other in- 

 sect, it is apparent that they are indeed most valuable friends to 

 mankind, a fact that should receive }nore than passing notice. 



In plants or flowers we have sex very similar to that in animals, and 

 it is just as necessary that fertilization take place in these before 

 fruit can be borne or seeds be developed. While both male and fe- 

 male sexes exist in the same flower of many plants, there are some 

 plants in which the male sex exists in one and the female in another 

 flower of the same plant, and in still others each sex is conflned en- 

 tirely to one plant. In any ease the arrangement is so that it is neees- 



(WVltYS 



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sary that the pollen grains from the anthers of the male part of one 

 blossom reach the stigma of the female part of another where they 

 enter into the ovules within the blossom and complete fertilization, 

 after which the development into fruit or seed follows. Without the 

 pollenation of the blossom, fertilization can not take place and the 

 blossom must wither aqd die instead of bearing fruit. If this phe- 

 nomenon is kept in mind it is ])()ssible to grasp quickly why the agency 

 of the honey bees as pollenatoi's is of immense importance and we can 

 better understand the examples that prove ab'-olutely facts that have 

 been long established, but which are, as yet, well, understood by com- 

 paratively few. 



SOME STRIKING EXAMPLES. 



Where many varieties of trees are mixed in an orchard there is 

 less trouble from the lack of proper pollenation if the weather is warm 

 and dry and the wind can carry the minute pollen grains from flower 

 to flower; but, even under these conditions, visits of bees make the 



