No. 542] 



COLOR SENSE OF THE HONEY-BEE 



87 



shades are invisible at night. But as a whole green 

 flowers are small or even minute and attract few insects/' 

 Since in Europe and America, where the insect fauna 

 is rich both in species and individuals and the flora dis- 

 plays a great variety of brilliant hues and delicate shades, 

 dull-colored flowers are not well adapted to entomophily, 

 it may be inferred that in a country where the flowers 

 are largely greenish there would be a scarcity of antho- 

 philous insects. According to A. E. Wallace and (1. M. 

 Thomson this condition is partially realized in the Islands 

 of New Zealand. Wallace says : 



In New Zealand where insects are strikingly deficient in variety the 



course there are some except inns, but. as a whole. grt , inconspicuous 



and imperfect flowers prevail to an extent not equalled in any other part 

 of the globe, and affording a marvellous contrast l . the general brilliancy 

 of Australian flowers, combined with the abundance and variety of it's 

 insect life. We must remember, too. that the few gay or conspicuous 

 flowering-plants possessed by New Zealand are almost all of Australian. 



because it is part of the same theory that the odors of flowers have, like 

 their colors, been developed to attract the insects required to aid in their 

 fertilization. I therefore at once applied to my friend Dr. Hooker, as 

 the highest authority on New Zealand botany; simply asking whether 

 there was any such observed deficiency. His reply was. New Zealand 

 plants are remarkably scentless. 



After quoting the above passage, G. M. Thomson, who 

 resided in New Zealand and made a special study of its 

 floroecology adds : 



It is impossible to differ from this reasoning in toto, because the 

 statements and facts on which it is founded are to a great extent correct, 

 though in the light of more recent knowledge they require considerable 



Bees and butterflies, according to Thomson, are com- 

 paratively rare; while Diptera, of which it is estimated 



South American, or Ei 



