3o8 



Marvels of the Universe 



Pholu ..;.j [Huntld lilUllii. 



THE NEST OF THE LEAF-CUTTING BEE. 



Skewing the tunnels bored in the decayed wood 

 by the industrious mother, and the neat cells piled 

 one on top or the other, each containing a single egg. 



shaped cell, and carefull}' mixes them in accordance 

 with a recipe which is an ancestral secret. \\'hen 

 the cell is more than half filled with the sweet 

 pudding, the bee lays an egg in it. She then makes 

 further excursions to the rose-bush, cuts her four 

 circular pieces of leaf, and uses them to close up the 

 cell's entrance. 



Having made all snug, the industrious bee pro- 

 ceeds at once to construct and provision another cell 

 (not forgetting to laj- an egg in it), and' so continues 

 until her tunnel is almost filled, the last inch or so of 

 space being plugged with wood-chips to keep out 

 intruders. 



In the accompanying photographs I show a 

 female Leaf-cutting Bee and underneath nine of 

 the eleven pieces of leaf which go to the formation 

 c>l a single cell. This will give the reader some 

 idea of the task which the industrious insect per- 

 torms. But it must be remembered that to the 

 labour of leaf-cutting and leaf-carrying is added 

 the gathering of provisions for each cell that is 

 made, not to mention the work of tunnelling which 

 is undertaken in the first instance. It seems 

 impossible to estimate the average number of cells 

 that a bee constructs in the course of the season, 

 for the reason that when one tunnel is filled the in- 

 sect may, and sometimes undoubtedly does, make 

 and fill a second tunnel. Moreover, two or more 

 bees not infrequently drive their tunnel close together 

 in the same piece of wood, and it becomes difficult to 

 decide exactly where the work of one little artisan 

 ends and that of another begins. 



Let us now turn to what I may call the nursery 

 life of the Leaf-cutting Bee. The egg in each cell 

 hatches a few days after it is laid, and the tiny 

 white bee-grub begins to feed upon the good things 

 provided by its mother. It literalh' wallows in 

 the sweet pudding and slowly absorbs it ; so that, 

 while at first there is a large quantity of pudding 

 and a very little grub, at the end of a few days 

 there is a big grub and no pudding at aU. For the 

 mother bee is such a wonderful cook that she 

 puts exactly the right quantity of food into the 

 cell. There is absolutely no waste ; and when the 

 grub has licked up the last atom of sweet pudding 

 its desire for food ceases quite suddenly. Its 

 babyhood is now over. It spins within its leaf-ceU 

 a cocoon of silk, coarse without, but very fine and 

 smooth within, and with a kind of cap at one 



