NATURE NOTES 
1 16 
249. A Wood Pigeon’s Short Bereavement.— Recently, there was 
found in the garden of my late residence the partly eaten remains of a wood 
pigeon, one of a pair, which no doubt had fallen a victim to the cat. For a few 
days the grief-stricken mate of the dead bird hovered round the spot, to all 
appearances inconsolable for her loss. However, the sorrowing bird did not wear 
the willow long. She soon found a balm for her grief in the form of another 
mate and at present is an expectant mother on her nest in a tree close to the 
scene of her late bereavement. 
37, Alwyne Villas, Canonbiiry, N. Chas. E. J- Hannett. 
April 9. 
250. Ducks Nesting in Kensington Gardens. — If a correspondent 
who writes as to a duck nesting in a tree near the Serpentine will look at some of 
our back volumes for the last few years he will find full accounts of this and other 
features of bird-life in the Gardens, in Mr. A. Holte Macpherson’s annual “ Notes 
on London Birds.” — E d. N.N, 
251. Honeydew. — Mr. Daubeny is mistaken. He quotes from me as 
saying that aphides are found on only a few kinds of trees. I said that these 
copious discharges of honeydew are found on only a few kinds of trees, instancing 
especially the maple and lime trees. I found none on poplar, plane, &c. , at the 
same time. 
I have not seen aphides on the leaves of any of the trees that I have seen 
covered with a profuse discharge of honeydew, running over and dropping on the 
pavement below. I only speak of things as I find them by observation, and I am 
only one observer among many. I hope Mr. Daubeny will excuse my still 
retaining my opinion that those great attacks of honeydew, covering our pave- 
ments as they did last summer, are not caused by aphides. I shall willingly 
change my opinion, when I see any evidence that they are. 
Hampstead, Peter Hastie. 
April 18, 1905. 
252. Fertilisation of the Primrose and Honey-suckle. — Last 
year the pages of Nature Notes contained interesting remarks on the pollina- 
tion of the primrose. I have watched the primrose with care ; and find that 
practically none of its flowers are fertilised by bees or moths, or flies with long 
proboscis, their visits being extremely rare. This office is carried out by very 
small insects that enter and move about inside the tube. On April 15 I 
examined a number of primroses, with the following results : 40 per cent, of the 
tubes were tenanted by small jet-black beetles about the size of a flea. In almost 
every instance there was a single pair, even at the bottom of the tube, or on the 
pollen inside the tube in about an equal number of cases. 
It is well known that the hive-bee does not visit the honey-suckle ; and it 
seems to me that many of its flowers would escape fertili.sation by humble bees or 
lepidoptera were it not for the agency of small insects. I.ast year I examined 
one of my honey-suckles. On every flower there were from thirty to ioity small 
insects somewhat in shape like thrips, but much larger. As these were lively 
and moved about in all directions, they must have proved efficient fertilisers. 
It should be added that bees of all kinds are very fond of visiting our garden 
Primulas. 
Edmund Tuos. Daubeny. 
P.S. — Let me add that on May 8 I examined the same plants I had seen in April, 
and picked twenty-five flowers. These I tore open and could find no insect of 
any kind in the tubes. I do not pretend to be a botanist, but as an entomologist 
should give the following interpretation. The small beetle’s reign had passed 
by previous to May 8 ; and, on the supposition that the primrose is fertilised 
principally by it, I should conclude that late primroses are less likely to have seed 
than early ones, and that Nature encourages early flowers in this plant. I have 
not seen any bee, fly, or moth, visit a primrose this spring and I am always on 
the look out. 
