226 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



June, 1907 



13 — About four thousand bees are clustered on both sides of the frame. The queen is 

 hidden by the guards and attendants who are massed around her for protection 



til two weeks after preparation. P'rom all this we may 

 conclude that young bees are not able to go out and become 

 expert harvesters at the first attempt. They have to learn 

 to gather honey 

 as they previously 

 learned to perform 

 various duties in the 

 interior of the hive. 



In regard to the 

 nurses which feed 

 the larva? and the 

 brooders which keep 

 the brood warm, as- 

 sist the young bees 

 to escape from their 

 cocoons, brush them, 

 clean them and un- 

 fold their wings, 

 bee-keepers are not 

 agreed concerning 

 the relation which 

 exists between the 

 performance of 

 these functions and 

 the age of the bee. 

 As a matter of fact, 

 there is no such re- 

 lation. If the brood is very numerous bees of all ages may 

 act as nurses and brooders, and we have seen that even the 

 drones are pressed into service as brooders in the busiest 

 harvest season. In experiments similar to those described 

 above I have observed that during the first week after 

 the appearance of the Italian bees, before one of them 

 had left the hive even for the pin-wheel exercise, a great 

 many of these young Italians acted as brooders, with the 

 assistance of very old black workers, whose age was indi- 

 cated by their ragged wings (Fig. 11). 



It appears, then, that the comparatively easy duties of 

 the brooder and the nurse are discharged, as a rule, by 

 newly born workers too young to act as harvesters and 

 by old, worn-out workers, which have ceased to be useful 

 except as sources of heat. 



All the preceding remarks relate to the regular work 

 of the colony. But what will happen if an unusual and 

 unforeseen event transpires within the hive or outside 

 of it? 



I have often repeated the following experiment: 



14 — Removing bees from the hive 



Frames filled with pieces of perfect comb, fastened with 

 twine, are placed In a hive. Now, the bees have never 

 seen twine in the hive, where its presence appears to them 

 intolerable, so, after partly destroying and reconstructing 

 the pieces of comb thus secured, and fastening their edges 

 with propolis, they gnaw the twine with their feeble man- 

 dibles. When a piece of twine Is gnawed off and falls to 

 the floor of the hive, the workers drag It outside and place 

 It parallel with the edge of the alighting board. Then 

 five or six workers arrange themselves at nearly equal dis- 

 tances along the cord, seize It with their mouths and fly 

 away with It to a safe distance from the hive, where they 

 let go simultaneously and drop the cord to the ground. 

 In this operation It is impossible to detect anything like 

 a command or to distinguish any "forewoman" in the lit- 

 tle band of workers. 



In conclusion I will describe an experiment which I 

 made last year relative to the communication of informa- 

 tion by one worker to another. I placed a drop of honey 

 on the mouth of a nectar-bearing flower much frequented 

 by bees and from it laid a train of honey to a much larger 

 drop some distance away. The bees which came succes- 

 sively to the flower in search of nectar at first paid no 

 attention to the honey, for bees are not easily turned aside 

 from the particular task in which they are engaged. An 

 hour and a half elapsed before one of the harvesters per- 

 ceived the honey 

 and discovered the 

 large drop. Beside 

 this she remained, 

 drawing honey, for 

 more than three 

 minutes, during 

 which I marked her 

 abdomen with col- 

 ored talcum pow- 

 der. She went to 

 the hive and in six 

 minutes returned di- 

 rectly to the site of 

 the drop, which I 

 had renewed during 

 her absence. After 

 she had made sev- 

 eral such journeys 

 I saw the same 

 marked bee return, 

 accompanied by two 

 recruits. I marked 

 these also and de- 

 posited several drops of honey around the spot. The num- 

 ber of recruits Increased. In three-quarters of an hour I had 

 marked fifteen bees which continued to bring others to the 



15 — Honey ready for the market 



