POLLINATION OF FLOWERS 
081 
of the bee, or the opposite of the arrange¬ 
ment in the pulse family. In nearly all 
species the stigma is touched first so that 
cross-pollination is ensured. Other peculiar¬ 
shaped bee-flowers are the larkspur, monks¬ 
hood, Dutchman’s breeches, (Dicentra), 
bleeding heart, climbing fumitory, the jew- 
elweed, fringed polygala, blue violet, and 
various orchids. 
In the heath and blueberry families there 
is another great group of bee-flowers, but 
unlike the members of the pulse and mint 
families, the species are all shrubs and 
trees. The Rhododendrons and Azaleas are 
showy bumblebee flowers, but the wheel¬ 
shaped flowers of the mountain laurel are 
readily pollinated by smaller bees. The 
heaths, fetterbush, Andromeda, leather-leaf, 
sourwood, the blueberries, and huckleberries 
have small white or pink bell-shaped or urn¬ 
shaped pendulous flowers, which are adapt¬ 
ed to bees, over which pollen is sprinkled 
from pores in the ends of the anthers. 
As the bumblebees have much longer 
tongues than the honeybees, in some species 
more than twice as long, there are a num¬ 
ber of bumblebee flowers, or flowers with 
the nectar so deeply concealed that bumble¬ 
bees alone of bees can reach it. Among the 
more common bumblebee-flowers are the 
red clover*, larkspur, columbine, monks¬ 
hood, snapdragon, the wood ebony, the 
Rhododendrons and many honeysuckles, 
gentians, and orchids. See Bumblebees 
-and Red Clover. 
It is a remarkable fact that bee-flowers 
are more often red and blue than yellow 
or white. In the northeastern States of 
34 species of violets 17 are blue, 4 blue pur¬ 
ple, 6 yellow, and 7 white. Of 197 species 
belonging to the pea' family (Papilion- 
aceae) 24 'are blue, 88 blue purple, 13 red, 
33 yellow, and 39 white; of 120 species of 
the mint family 33 are blue, 12 red, 4 yel¬ 
low and 24 white. In the German and 
Swiss floras there are 482 bee-flowers, ot 
which 330 are red, violet, or blue, and 152 
white or yellow. Honeybees and bumble¬ 
bees have been observed to make 20 per 
cent more visits to red and blue flowers 
than to. yellow and white flowers. So keen 
an observer as the honeybee can easily 
* In later years it has been discovered that 
honeybees are doing most of the pollinating of 
red clover. 
learn to associate blue coloring with the 
flowers most likely to supply it with nectar. 
Honeybees by no means restrict them¬ 
selves to bee-flowers, but visit all flowers 
with nectar accessible to them, as well as 
many flowers which yield only pollen. Un¬ 
der Fruit Blossoms the great value of 
the honeybee in pollination has been shown 
in detail. It is an indisputable fact that a 
large number of trees and shrubs will not 
produce fruit unless cross-pollinated. The 
importance of the honeybee in this work 
cannot be overemphasized. The fruit culture 
of the future must be largely dependent on 
the domestic bee, the only agency in cross- 
pollination that can be controlled by man. 
The wild bees are wholly inadequate in 
numbers to pollinate the vast areas devoted 
to many crops, which are more or less ster¬ 
ile in the absence of cross-pollination. The 
production of seed by buckwheat, alsike 
clover, sweet clover, red clover, and sain¬ 
foin is largely dependent upon the honey¬ 
bee. 
North America has been called a natural 
garden, so abundant are its native fruits. 
But in the absence of cross-pollination our 
native plums, cherries, blueberries, huckle¬ 
berries, currants, gooseberries, and scores 
of other wild fruits are largely or wholly 
barren. Many ornamental flowers both 
wild and cultivated are also largely depend¬ 
ent on cross-pollination as Wistaria, labur¬ 
num, calceolaria, foxglove, pansy, geran¬ 
ium, nasturtium, passion flower, abutilon, 
mountain laurel, primrose, snapdragon, 
and many orchids. There are likewise a 
great number of plants with inconspicuous 
flowers which produce no seed in the ab¬ 
sence of crossing. 
Finally, if crossing between different 
species has played as important a role in 
the development of the flowering plants, as 
Lotsy and Jeffrey believe, then a great 
number of forms which have been regarded 
as distinct species are hybrids. Cross-fer¬ 
tilization is every year taking place on an 
extensive scale, and under favorable • con¬ 
ditions new species arise. Thus not only in 
the development of the great group of flow¬ 
ering plants( Angiosperms) has the hon¬ 
eybee been a most important factor, but 
its services in maintaining the productive¬ 
ness of many species are inestimable. 
