39G THE ZOOLOGIST. 



Dr. Horvath informs me that he considers it certain that the species 

 has been introduced into Europe, an opinion with which I entirely 

 agree. I, however, would go further, and conclude that it has been 

 introduced from India, it being well known that the headquarters 

 of the genus Bhododenclron is in the Himalayan region, and four 

 species of Stephanitis are already recorded from British India. It 

 will almost certainly be found by other horticulturists on rhodo- 

 dendrons in this country, and is therefore worth recording and 

 figuring. — W. L. Distant. 



Bees killed by Wasps. — Eeferring to my notes in ' The Zoologist ' 

 (ante, p. 337) regarding the finding of dead bees which had been 

 picked up by Mr. Carter beneath the blossoms of some lime-trees, a 

 few specimens of which had been kindly sent for my inspection, 

 Mr. Carter informed me quite recently that a person at Saltaire 

 has discovered that the perforations in the thorax were due to wasps, 

 thus confirming the footnote by the Editor, in which it is stated 

 that specimens of B. lucorum, which had been stupefied by the 

 flowers of lime-trees, and then attacked by wasps, which made per- 

 forations in the thorax, had been sent by Dr. Giinther to the British 

 Museum. I was, however, informed by Mr. Carter that the person at 

 Saltaire had climbed the lime-trees and actually witnessed the modus 

 operandi, from which I gathered that wasps in these cases first 

 sting the bees so as to stupefy them, after which they begin to 

 perforate the thorax, and in many cases the abdomen, for the purpose 

 of extracting their contents. I may say that we have kept wasp- 

 nests in our garden for many years, but I never witnessed a wasp 

 attack a bee (Bombus), although we made experiments with almost 

 all kinds of insects. Tywort-flowers are very attractive to both bees 

 and wasps, but I never saw the latter actually attack and kill bees, 

 although they would drive each other away. 



With regard to the observations of Mr. Selous in ' The Zoologist ' 

 (ante, p. 327) on Humble-Bees in relation to the flowers of the fox- 

 glove, it does not seem difficult to conceive that it may be an ad- 

 vantage to bees which visit certain kinds of flowers, such as the 

 foxglove, to extract nectar from perforations at the base of the 

 corolla in preference to entering at its mouth. Those bees which 

 enter the flower by the latter method are more likely to become 

 stupefied than the former. It may be said en passant that anyone 

 who has even a casual acquaintance with our Bombi cannot but have 

 been driven to the conclusion that no little unproductiveness is 

 caused by such stupefaction. — E. P. Butterfield (Wilsden). 



