188 
SOUTH AUSTRALIA. 
Mr. Spafford, Superintendent of Experimental Work, Department of Agriculture, 
Adelaide, kindly favours me with the following remarks about his State : 
" From what I have seen of apiaries in this State, (1) the majority are placed 
in the Blue Gum (E. leucoxylon) country, (2) some in the Sugar Gum (E. corynocalyx 
belt on Eyre's Peninsula, (3) some in the Adelaide Hills where the Red Gum (E. rostrata) 
and Stringybark (E. obliqua) predominate amongst trees, but here I think the under- 
growth plays a great part in providing honey, and (4) some among the E. fasciculosa. 
" Eucalyptus odorata is considered a good honey-producer, and much of the 
E. leucoxylon country where bees are kept shades off into E. odorata country. Again, 
some of our E. leucoxylon country shades off into E. viminalis and E. capitellata, so 
possibly these two species have something to do in helping the bee-keepers." 
Pollen. 
Next to honey, pollen is the principal food which animals seek for in flowers. 
There are some plants from which honey is entirely absent, and which offer only pollen 
to the food-seeking animals. Bees and humble-bees collect pollen in large quantities 
and carry it to their nests as food for the larvae. 
I have already referred to the fact that hitherto there has been but little research 
work in regard to Australian native pollen plants, particularly Eucalyptus. 
Edge worth's work on " Pollen " depicts no Eucalyptus, nor do the beautiful 
figures in Kerner and Oliver, ii, 98, 99, 101. The Gardeners' Chronicle of 8th December, 
1900, has some excellent figures, but they are not Australian subjects. 
In " Eucalyptographia," under E. pachyphylla are two slight sketches of pollen 
grains x 300. 
Under E. erythrocorys Mueller has shown that the size of pollen grains varies in 
different species, but we require very many more measurements than are available 
to be in a position to place any interpretation upon the results. This list contains 
forty-eight specie, and Ilu sizes given vary between -0128 mm. and -033 mm. Most 
of them are given as -0268 mm. (11 species), -0229 mm. (11 species), -0203 mm. (9 
species), -((178 mm. (9 species). An investigation as to the shapes of the pollen grains 
and the relative size might be useful for a number of young microscopists to undertake. 
Casuarnm tondosa (Forest Oak) is the tree from which pollen is mostly obtained 
in this district (Forester Stopford, Penrith). Doubtless this is more or less the case 
in regard to all our native oaks. 
Mr. R. Waters has a series of three brief papers in the N.Z. Journal of Agriculture, 
iber and November, 1915, and April, 1916, entitled, " Pollen Grains as Source 
The first paper begins with an account of the technique of the 
