Jan. 1908. J 



51 



Live Stock. 



and placed the broken piece horizontally, resting on a stick which supported the 

 comb and on another cross-bar. It was discovered three days afterwards that the 

 bees had raised this broken piece and fixed it perpendicularly above the first one by 

 means of irregular cells. The workers' cells are nearly four to the centimetre and about 

 6 millimetres deep. Those of the males are much larger, about two to the centimetre 

 with a depth of about \\ millimetres. Those of the queens are 25 millimetres long 

 and 12 millimetres thick. Honey cells are three to the centimetre and as much as 13 

 millimetres deep. The comb has always reached its complete growth about 20 to 25 

 centimetres in diameter before the d rone cells are added to it as an appendage. Imme- 

 diately below are attached as many as six or seven queen cells. The worker is black 

 with transparent wings, with the first three sections of the abdomen pale ferruginous 

 colour, the others having black and white bands, white down on the body and along 

 margin of the segments of the abdomen ; length 9 millimetres ; general form some- 

 what long. Male entirely black with white down all over the body except on the 

 upper part of the last segments of the abdomen; eyes blue; big and pot-bellied, 

 length 12*5 millimetres. Queen black body, the first two segments of the abdomen 

 ferruginous, the others with alternate bands of ferruginous colour and black ; length 

 14 millimetres. These bees have a peculiarity ; when flying or gathering honey they 

 produce no perceptible sound. Quantity of honey insignificant ; not more than half 

 a pint for a numerous swarm. But these bees are excellent for observation ; easy to 

 obtain and build in the open. One can carry them on their branch from one place to 

 another, or even put them in a box provided you leave large openings. In spite of 

 their open situation they are never attacked by the wax moth, but after one year 

 they seem to get tired of their comb and leave the lower part of it to rats and 

 jackals. Apis dorsata seems to do the same, at least author has found complete 

 combs abandoned without any trace of wax moth or foul brood. These species 

 resemble each other in another particular. In the plains there is no winter 

 and Apis indica gathers honey and pollen all the year round, Apis florea and 

 Apis dorsata on the contrary stop work almost entirely from the beginning 

 of November to the beginning of January. Daring this period they go our 

 a little especially at noon ; reason unknown. If they have no nest at the 

 beginning of the season they do not begin one, and if they had begun one they do not 

 continue it. Such at least is the author's experience. On one occasion a big 

 swarm of Apis dorsata had been driven from a temple and had established itsel 

 on a branch of Acacia. After one month this was cut and carried to the top 

 of the College, but in vain. There was no trace of a comb, and as the bees had 

 nothing to attach them to this branch they flew off two days afterwards. This 

 inaction cannot be explained by cold, for the whole time the mean temperature 

 is 29 degrees (81 degrees Fahrenheit) which is much higher thanfthese same bees 

 have in certain parts of hills even during the height of summer. Though these bees> 

 and especially Apis florea, adapt themselves easily to every locality they seem to 

 require a long time to make their choice. Swarms of the two varieties have been 

 seen waiting on a branch near their hive as much as five or six days till the explorers 

 whom they have sent out have found another which suits them. The care with 

 which these explorers worked is shown by the following instance. For some time 

 the College was visited almost every evening by a bee of the Apis dorsata breed. 

 They passed and repassed on the terrace and along the corridors of the upper 

 storeys as if they wished to make an inspection of the place. This was all the more 

 puzzling, till then they had seldom been seen on the flowers in the gardens, and at 

 the same time the College seemed to be too fully inhabited to afford hope of their 

 taking up their residence in it. However, at 10 o'clock one morning the bees invaded 

 the corridor of the second storey by hundreds, entering the rooms, examining every 

 corner and collecting in larger and larger numbers on a beam at the eastern entrance 



