BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
We have control over the sexual intercourse of the domesticated animals. Cattle breeders, sheep farmers, agriculturalists, orchardists, horticulturists, and indeed everyone, whether engaged in the culture of the soil or not, thoroughly understand this; but we do not find the same knowledge of the methods of reproduction in vegetable life amongst farmers and others. But agriculturalists and those engaged in vegetable culture do not as a rule know that plants are reproduced on precisely similar lines as animals.
Schools of Science are established to unravel the secrets of Nature in the mineral kingdom, anatomical classes are open to students who intend to make a living by operating on other than their own frames, and Veterinary Schools do the same for those who desire to so work on the lower animals. All engaged in the breeding of animals know exactly how to mate so as to produce certain results. Sires are carefully bred, more carefully selected, and most carefully reared. All know, if they take the haphazard chances of permitting animals to breed according to their own will, weedy and valueless ones of no market worth are the result. In cattle they know how to cross-breed their animals so as to obtain the best results for the butcher or the dairyman; or, if it be sheep, they know how to breed for wool or meat; or, if it be horses, they breed for strength or for speed. And all this is done from the knowledge possessed of the procerative powers in both sire and dam. Why is not a similar knowledge applied to fruit or any other crop? Because not one out of a thousand has sufficient knowledge of their occupation to understand that there is a sexuality in plants and that fertilisation is as necessary in plants as in animals.
I said just now that pollen is the fertiliser, and that this substance is possessed by all flowering plants. The one great aim of all vegetable and animal life is to reproduce itself or to perpetuate its species.
Both sexes in all the higher orders of animals possess locomotive powers that enable them to come together at certain seasons for procreative purposes. At other seasons the sexes studiously avoid each other, and in some gregarious animals they separate and form independent flocks, as amongst yellowhammers, chaffinches, wild American turkeys, and deer.
Locomotive powers in plant life are very rare, and where they possess these powers it is more for the distribution of fertilised seeds than for the purpose of fertilisation. There are exceptions, I know--the \(Valliseria\)\(spirulis\), for instance.
The higher order of animals are unisexual; occasionally there are malformations termed hermaphrodites; but in the plant world the higher orders are unisexual, bisexual, or hermaphrodites--unisexual when the male and the female blooms or organs are on separate plants; bisexual when the male and female organs are in separate flowers but on the same plant, hermaphrodite when the procreative organs are both in the same bloom (Laurels, 1st; pumpkins, corn, &c., 2nd; apples, pears, &c., 3rd). Yet, nevertheless, no true flower is hermaphrodite--_i.e._, not hermaphrodite as the term is applied to the animal kingdom. The stammal and pistiline organs are' not abnormal malformations, but both organs are perfect and independent of each other, and as a rule in hermaphrodite plants the anthers become distributive before the stigma becomes receptive, or _riee versa_; or, to make it clearer, the receptive and distributive organs do not mature at one and the same time in the same flower.
From this it will be seen how utterly impossible it is, in the great majority of cases, for the anther, when distributive, to come into juxtaposition with the receptive stigma to effect the necessary discharge of pollen to ensure fructification. I am speaking now only of entomophalous plants.
Officimes in unisexual that are entomophalous the stammate plant when in bloom is at a considerable distance from the pistiline; and in bisexuals both genders of flowers mature at the same time but on different parts of the same plants, while in hermaphrodites the sexes may be in close proximity; nevertheless the male and female organs do not mature at one and the same time, then how can these inert beings become impregnated but by an agent other than itself--a foreign agent? In nearly every case the pollen of entomophalous plants is not dry but powdery as in the case with anemophilous blooms, but heavy and highly adhesive. It is this property of the pollen gathered by bees that enables them to stow it away so neatly in their pollen baskets. Its adhesive nature prevents its being blown about by winds, and causes an outside agent necessary to transmit it from the male to the female organs.
Now comes the question, why are bees attracted to blossons! I mention bees because they are the only insects that gather and store both pollen and honey. Other insects feed on one or the other or both, but with these it is consumed where gathered--that is, it is consumed on the premises.
I am not ignorant of the fact that the perceptive organs in insects are extremely acute, especially in social bees, and that they can both recognise colour and form. All bee-keepers know that when young bees take their first flights how cautiously they survey the landmarks surrounding their habitations, and where large numbers of colonies are kept, and where every hive is the same pattern and colour, how necessary it is, when the virgin queens are taking their nuptial flights, to place distinguishing marks here and there to ensure the safe return of the young queen to her home. But that bees are led to flowers by the colour they possess, and that certain bright colours--red, blue, purple, &c.--are more attractive to them than paler tints, such as white, yellow, etc., my experience most certainly contradicts. I know that the highest authorities on the subject have written and stated that it is so, and it may appear something like gross presumption on my part to attempt to refute their statements. No doubt some of them have given the experience of observation, but by far too many have been satisfied by stating I was informed by Mr. So-and-So of certain movements in regard to bees and flowers.
Sir John Lubbock, in his work on 'Bees, Ants, and Wasps,' says : 'Most botanists are now agreed that insects, and especially bees, have played a very important part in the development of flowers.",,, "In cases of brightly coloured flowers the pollen is carried by the agency of insects." "I thought," he writes, 'it would be desirable to prove this, if possible, by actual fact. I brought a bee to some honey which I placed on blue paper, and about 3 feet off I placed a similar quantity of honey on orange paper.' Why he need to place a _similar_ quantity I cannot tell, and why he should have _brought_ instead of allowing a bee to find it is a problem I cannot solve. Now comes the question--was the bee attracted by the blue paper or the honey food? I have placed honey in a blue campanula, and many other flowers of both conspicuous and unconscious colours. When food is scarce bees will visit any colour; but when it is very plentiful they object to take honey already gathered. Last summer, in my garden, I had a scarlet dahlia in bloom. When it first lowered there was not a stamen present. No bees ever visited it. The plant was afterwards neglected by me, and this neglect caused the stamens to appear, and the anthers to develop and the pollen to mature. With this bee improvement in the flower it soon became a foraging ground for them. Why did they not visit the early blooms? Because there was no bee-food present. And why did they so visit it when the stannens appeared? The flowers were not nearly so conspicuous as the earlier blooms. But in passing over they saw there was a reward for their labour. Double flowers--I mean flowers in which the whole of the stannens have become petals--are far more showy and conspicuous than single ones, both being of the same variety, and the same colour. Bees abhor double flowers, no matter of what colour, but single ones they love ; but it is cupboard love, and cupboard love only.
Early last spring the white Arm lily (_Arm infire-mins_) was in bloom, and its white pollen was eagerly sought for by bees. At the same time the broad beans were in full flower. These, too, were an attractive foraging ground for the same insects. A little later the peach trees burst into flower, with the result that the first-named was entirely foresaken, and the latter receiving only an occasional visit. Did the bees go to the peach tree on account of their attractive colours? Not a bit of it. While the peaches were in flower so were the willows (_Salire babglonia_) just throwing out their catkins. When these two trees, peaches and willows, were in bloom my bees were bringing in pollen of two colours, one creamy white and the other somewhat of an orange tint. At the same time, in the district where I live there were roses, marigolds, arum liliies, and other attractive flowers in full bloom, but few bees were visiting them. The pollen was coming in from the willows and peach trees; there was also honey coming in from the latter. The flowers (catkins) on the willows are so inconspicuous that a large number of people are ignorant of the fact that they are phanero-gamic; yet they were as attractive to the bees as the gaudy peach trees. During the same spring, and at about the same time, I visited the Botanical Gardens, and the most attractive beds of flowers then in bloom were the English daisies, pansies, anemones, and the turban ranunculus. Nothing in the Gardens were more showy than the two latter, yet no bee visited them. Near these was a shrub (_Burus semperrirens_), in which there was a constant hum from the bees. What was the cause? Hidden among the dark green foliage there were hundreds of small greenish flowers, supplying abundance of food. If colour had been the attractive agent, bees would never have discovered their food in the shrub, and they would have sought the showy beds of anemones, de., in vain; they were double, and therefore there was no pollen food. But who will dare to say the attractive colour was absent? A short time afterwards I saw the _homaginvillens_ along with their showy bracts; they could be seen hundreds of yards away. At the same time the pitto-sporums were in flower. These latter were so inconspicuous that before they could be detected you need stand directly under them. I visited both--the bougainvilleas and the pittsporum; in the former there was not a bee to be seen, notwithstanding their fiery glow, whilst in the latter there was a sound as if a swarm of bees had taken possession of it."
Mr. Baker, of the Technological Museum, informed me that he observed a specimen of \(I^{\prime}\)_num_\(\mathit{sumbicofilins}\) swarming with bees, although it bears a small, very inconspicuous flower. A fence divided it from an enclosure of brightly-coloured garden flowers, yet these were passed over unheededed. Why did the bees neglect the garden flowers? Because the yield of food was not equal to that in the _num_\(\mathit{sumbicofilins}\). In none of the cases I have named were the bees attracted by the colours, but by what they could get in the form of food.
Many years ago, when in Cooma, I had a bed of turnips in flower that from daylight to dark were besieged by bees. Suddenly the bees forsook them. I found the cause to be that a small pad dock of lucerne near by had been permitted to flower, and the bees had gone thither. Were they attracted by the purple flowers! Not a bit of it. Lucerne, like other trefoils, produce an abundance of bee food, far more than any of the cruciforms, and the bees had gone where they could get the greatest quantity in the shortest space of time. In about twenty-four hours afterwards the lucerne was cut, and the bees returned to the turnips.
Darwin says : "It would appear that either the taste or the odour of the nectery of certain flowers are unattractive to hive-bees or to humble-bees or to both, for there seems no reason why certain open flowers which secrete nectar are not visited by both. The small quantity of nectar secreted by some of these flowers can hardly be the cause of their neglect, as hive-bees search eagerly for the minute drops on the glands of the leaves of the _Pellus Introceans."_ The small quantity was the cause, as was the reason my bees left the turnips for the lucerne.
Early one spring 1 saw bees eagerly working the flower-heads of couch-grass. We all know that the flower of the couch has not an attractive colour. The endemic or native flowers intermixed here and there with them were far more showy. Looking into my bees I found young larvae were plentiful; pollen for bee-bread was needed. The endemic flowers were producing little or none, but on the couch-grass there was a fairly good supply, and this supply was the cause of their neglecting the brighter coloured blooms for the greenish-yellow flowers of the couch-grass.
Watch a large bed of poppies of mixed colours. No one colour is neglected by the bees. They are as eager to forage in the white as in the red. Poppies are great pollen producers.
Again Darwin says : "bees repeatedly passed in a direct line from one variety to another of the same species, although they bore very differently-coloured flowers. I observed bees also flying in a straight line from one clump of yellow-flowered _Genthera_ to every clump of the same plant in the garden without turning an inch from their course to plants of _Eschseloltzia_ and others with yellow flowers, which lay a foot or two on either side." 'In these cases," he continues, 'the bees knew the position of each plant in the garden, so that they were guided by experience and memory." Their experience was that the _Genthera_ contained more food, and Nature had taught them that it would be impossible to fertilise the ovaries of _Genthera_ with the pollen from _Eschseloltzia_.
Darwin on ''Self-fertilisation of Plants'' says :--''Not only do the bright colours of flowers serve to attract insects, but dark-coloured streaks and marks are often present, which Sprengel long ago maintained served as guides to the nectery.'' If such be the case, how the poor bees must be troubled to find the nectery in self-coloured flowers. I think we have more unicolour flowers than striped ones. If Sprengel maintained it was so long ago, _then_ it may have been so; but I maintain, that _none_ in these latter days it is not so.
Grant Allen, in ''The Story of the Plant,'' has written some fanciful pictures on the influence of the markings and colours of flowers and their attraction for bees. I know the work is not a text book. He says :--''The lines or spots so often found on the petals of highly-developed flowers act as honey guides to lead the bee or other fertilising insect direct to the nectar.'' He then goes on to describe the ''so-called nasturtium.'' ''The upper pair (of petals) are broad and deep-lined with dark veins, which all converge about the month of the spur, and so show the inquiring insect exactly where to go in search of honey. The lower three on the other hand, have no lines or markings, but possess a curious sort of fence running right across the face, intended to prevent other flying insects from alighting and riling the flower without fertilising it.'' Now, if any insect, flying, creeping, or crawling, were to enter the nasturtium and rille the flower of its pollen and carry it to one where the stigma was receptive, and the part of the insect's body with pollen on it came in contact with the stigma, fertilisation would be the result. But why do the markings that converge about the throat of any act as guide-posts to them, while we have so many unicolour flowers that are destitute of such markings--to wit, the whole of the pumpkin family, and hundreds of others. Pumpkins, &c., cannot be fertilised other than by insects, and the blooms have no finger-post erected saying, ''Here you can get good honey and pollen ''
Yesterday I was watching the bees working the pumpkin flowers, and none of them were at a loss to find the pollen or the nectery. There was no hesitancy. The only finger-post for bees in flowers is the food they contain.
Darwin himself says he is not quite sure that in every case the colour and markings of flowers are for the sole purpose of attracting insects.
I have seen questions something like the following put in agricultural examination papers : "What is the use of colour and perfume in blooms? Such questions should never be put, when we consider that a large majority of the blooms in agricultural crops are anemophilous, and many an observant student can dispute the fact that colour is the attraction.
What is the experience of bee-keepers this side of the equator as it regards the colour of flowers that are chiefly visited by bees? There is no denying that some of our endemic or native flowers are as brightly coloured as the exotics or introduced ones. Before the introduction of our fruit-trees and highly-coloured garden flowers, the chief honey-gathering social insect was the little native bee (_Trigour earthamerio_), and, therefore, it was the chief fertiliser in Australia.
Darwin tells us that it took ages on the other side of the world for the flowers to develop into what they now are in both colour and form, and the bees centuries of training to adapt themselves to the flowers as they developed.
Space will not let me give Darwin's quotations, but all entomologists and botanists are acquainted with the facts.
The chief honey-yielding plants of this continent are the eucalyptus, pittsporun, and tea-tree families, and all these bear whitish flowers. Our introduced fruit-trees and ornamental flowering plants bear brightly-coloured blooms. In spring time our introduced fruit-trees are conspicuous by the multiplicity of their flowers, and our little native bee as readily finds the nectar in them as our introduced bee, and they cannot have had tie ages of experience to guide them.
And does it not seem very strange that our hive bee, upon its introduction here, and before it had been sufficiently colonised, should have forsaken the bright-coloured flowers of the Old Land that were introduced here at the same time they were? Our exotics and our hive bee, as far as Australia is concerned, are coeval. **U**ntold generations of bees had been trained to work blossoms in the land of our fathers, and their experience had most, if not all, we are told, to do with the development of species and the production of the showy flowers we now see around us. But when the hive bee crossed the Atlantic and the Pacific, and came here and found they were among their old friends of the gardens, they forsook them and bestowed their attention upon the simple whitish honey-bearing flowers of the State, a colour that the writers on the subject
## Chapter 32.1 Bee Calendar.
With the horticulturalist "'there is always something to tie, or to stick, or to mend"'; so with the bee-keeper. Although there is no delving and digging, still every month brings its allotted work. The hot days of January are very trying to both bees and bee-keepers. The latter is wishing he could work under an umbrella or other sunshade. Well, this autumn, prepare for next summer, unless you have been sufficiently wise to have followed the advice given in the chapter on "'Summer and Winter Protection for Bees," In some parts of New South Wales undoubtedly the bees are suffering from the excessive heat--combs are melted, bees suffocated, and honey running to waste, causing an abundance of robbing to be carried on. During this great heat, if you cannot protect yourself, you must protect your bees from such accidents as above recorded. If there be no natural shade, an artificial one must be at once adopted. A sheet of bark sufficiently large to extend about a foot over each side of the hive will answer the purpose splendidly. In the absence of it, a piece of board or an old bag, can be substituted. Permit the bag to hang down on either side of the hive. In the first place, put a couple of pieces of stick across it so as to leave a sufficient space for air to circulate. Weight the covering, whatever it might be, to prevent the wind from blowing it off.
Most of the directions for last month will also apply to this. Prevent swarming, if honey be desired; but if it be intended to increase colonies it is not too late to do so, as there is plenty of time for gathering in the winter's stores. Remove sections as they become capped, and store them for use. Occasionally overlook them for the purpose of keeping the bee moth down. If it gets a footing amongst them great damage will be done. Give all the ventilation possible at the mouth of the hive. It will be noted that all the young brood, perhaps none of them, are sealed over. In very hot seasons bees make it a rule not to seal brood in a chrysalis form. A small hole is left for extra ventilation. The bee-keepermust aid them as much as possible by removing all obstructions from the entrances. If the bees are seen hanging idly in clusters outside the hive, as they do sometimes before swarming, see that there is plenty room inside for storing.
### 11.1 February
In some districts gluts of honey will be coming in, and if the supers be not regularly and systematically removed the bees will store in the brood-chamber. It is highly essential that there should be plenty of room, both for brood purposes and for storage. If 1-1b, sections be desired, and honey cannot be put on the table in a more attractive form, they should be overhauled at least once a week, and all that are capped should be removed and stored out of the way of ants and other bee vermin. It is not wise to store sections unless every cell is capped. See that the separators are so placed that the sections cannot be built out. If the section crates only hold one tier, it is well the separators should be sufficiently wide to come to the top of the section and leave only bee space at the bottom. Metal separators are far preferable to wooden ones. Keep the sections as close together as possible : by so doing they are easily removed and are freer from propolis, which is a consideration, because it saves the time of the bees in more ways than one.
Protect the tops of the hive from the direct rays of the sun, or you will find the combs give way with the heat.
Give all the ventilation you can. If all the means in the hive be not sufficient to keep a cool current of air passing through, prop up the hive a little from the floor-board.
Queen-raising should now be over. Nucleus colonies should be united under the best queen among them. In uniting place about eight good frames togeiher and put on a half super. Attend to the instructions given elsewhere _re_ uniting.
Ventilation, shade, and the storage of all surplus honey are the important factors for this month.
### 11.2 March
The order at the close of last month will be the order for the beginning of this--_i.e._, ventilation, protection from the direct rays of the sun, the uniting of queenless colonies, and the storage of honey.