New YorK AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. Sis 
bees in one colony died a few days after the application, and 
many in another. Arsenic was found in the bodies of the dead 
bees and in their dead brood. Thus bees may take the poison 
home and feed it to the young, killing the brood in the 
hive. A recent instance of great destruction of bees from spray- 
ing trees when in bloom is given by E. P. Felt, New York State 
Entomologist, in Country Gentleman for June, 1900. In some 
‘cases 80 to 95 per ct. of the working bees were killed. “ The des- 
truction was fearful, and there is every reason to think that it 
was due to poison thrown upon trees in blossom.” 
The observations of many practical orchardists seem to throw 
much doubt on the whole question of the relation of bees to pol- 
lination and to spraying, and seem to demand that the subject be 
opened for further inquiry. While working in the orchards of 
Orleans and Niagara counties every day for ten days during the 
past ‘blossoming season, not a single bee or other insect was 
observed working on the blossoms. This was probably due to 
the cold and windy weather which prevailed during most of the 
blossoming season. Several fruit-growers in that section like- 
wise reported the absence of all insect pollination in their or- 
chards. Yet the set of fruit was the best since 1896. The wind is 
probably a factor in the cross-pollination of apples. If the pollen 
is moist or sticky, as in most varieties of pears, it is not readily 
blown away by the wind; hence insects are more important in the 
- eross-pollination of this fruit. But the pollen of apple blossoms 
is usually nearly, or quite, dry and is probably carried by wind. 
But even if apple blossoms can be pollinated by wind, it may 
yet be true that insects are more efficient agents. Again, the 
varieties most commonly grown in Western New York, Baldwin 
and Rhode Island Greening, do not usually need cross-pollination 
in order to produce good crops. They are self-fertile. It was 
shown in Cornell Bulletin 181, however, that cross-pollination 
even of these varieties may be expected to give better fruit than 
self-pollination. 
