Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1906-04-05
Great Stupidity of Bees.

money bees show many qualities of
! nigh order of instinct, but they also
show, in a great many instances,
remarkable degree of stupid1ty,
writes Louis Rhead in the Outlook
Yet for centuries poets and writers
have held them up as paragons of
wisdom. Maurice Maeterlinck, in
| his most poetical description of the
nuptial fight of the queen bee and
the dramatic death of the favorite
| lover, is one instance. On the other
hand, Sir John Lubbock, in his Ants
Bees and Wasps,' disnlisses the hon
ey bee with little ceremony, finding
it infinitely less interesting and in
teliigent than the ant There is no
! question that the ant at every turn
outwits the bee in its home by steal
| ing It's hard-earned store. In fact,
so numerous are the enemies of bees
that 1t is no wonder that they are
| supplied by nature with means to re-
sist and even to attack the thieves
who wish to take their earnings.
First comes the bee moth, whose
caterpillar bores through the comb;
then the ant, the spider, and the wild
bumblebee. The caterpillar of the
bee moth bores and destroys the
comb; the spider kills the bees and
sucks their blood, and the ant, the
wild bumblebee and various flies
steal the honey. These enemies
hover about and commit their depre-
dations near the hive, and were it
not for the extraordinary fecundity
OF the queen mother the bees strug-
gle for existence would soon cease.
| One would naturally conclude that
so bold creature would have the
faculty of resisting its numerous
small enemies, but, in fact, it is ex-
actly the opposite. The bee seems
paralyzed by a spider. Although it's
vision and scent are so keen that it
cannot fail to see a spider busily
working and weaving its web right
in front OF, the mouth of the hive. yet
one after another will fly right into
the web, to sure death. One of the
beekeeper's constant duties is to
clear spiders away from the vicinity
of the hive, especially from the en-
| trance
In front of one of my hives l
grew Japanese iris. On this the
spiders would string their web, car
| rying it to the hive so that one out
OF every 90 bees emerging and enter
ing would be captured In every in
stance where have watched bee
entangled in the web its first and
only object was to free itself. While
1t is struggling the spider winds it
/ securely and not till this is done
does he use his nippers to draw
blood; the struggle gets fainter; still
the bee, equal or superior in size
and strength, has opportunity to
sting, but does not, but simply makes
all effort possible to get free.
with ants the case is different.
| because they invariably enter the
| hive, and as they are unable to fly,
the bee has the advantage of being
able to pounce upon them and hold
them down. Last winter a colony of
ants made their way into the hive
/ by boring through a crevice in the
I footboard, which was old and com
paratively rotten. During the fall
they bored passages in all directions,
i and there located their colony, and
at intervals climbed up to the cells,
! stealing the honey and depositing it
for future use. In midwinter the
bees usually come out of the hives
from time to time. But from this
+; hive no bees appeared. I was some
! what surprised that -four colonies
came out of the hives and one did
not. On lifting the top found the
| combs covered with the entire col
ony. and every one stone dead-40-
600 bees motionless, their bodies
shining as naturally as in life.
lifted the frames out to make an ex-
animation. and in so doing lifted the
| body Of the hive from the footboard
This disclosed large and numerous
colony of ants in semidormant con-
dition, with plentiful supply Of hon
ey in their quarters. l came to the
conclusion that the ants had stolen
every particle of the bees winter
| food and the bees were consequently
starved to death.
The question arises, Why are not
bees endowed with instinct to de-
stroy so persistent an enemy? They
have the same sense of smell and
the same sense of sight as the ant
yet in this instance probably months
of depredations on their hardearned
stores went serenely on without any
effort to stop it. The average num-
Der of bees in a healthy hive is
| about 10000. yet venture to believe
that so per cent in one year come to
an untimelv end.
Again, on bright days during the
winter they will issue forth. No
matter IL the snow is ON the ground
and the air is chilI, il only the sun
shines, they viii fy around. / have
seen them IN these occasions " fr,,.