The Brookings register. [volume] (Brookings, Brookings County, S.D.) 1903-1971, 1909-01-14

successful agriculture. Nature has
ordained one supreme law, that of
creation, the perpetuatioA of the race
type. This law, universal in it's ap.
plication and absolutely identical In
its form, obtains in the plant world
as In the animal world. The luscious
pulp of the fruit Is the envelope, the
package, the strong box. devised by
nature to protect the seed within from
injury and render 1t susceptible Of
termination 10 that the type may be
reproduced in all Its perfection.
The bee, like other. insects, effects
incidental pollination of flowers in its
search for nectar; but its great value
to the fruit grower lies in this, that
it goes to the flowers specifically to
gather pollen, literally by the carload,
in the hairy baskets of its legs, hasten
ing from bloom to bloom, rolling and
packing and literally rioting in the
golden dust, pregnant with the micro
scopic germs Of plant life, until the
golden pellets are packed away in it's
hair baskets, to be carried to the hive
for storage as an indispensable por-
ton of the food of it's young during
the winter months to come.
1T requires no expert knowledge to
comprehend how perfectly the bee
thus performs the Office Of pollination.
Indeed. it is natures chief agent in
this indispensable work. Nc seed. no
fruit is the universal law. Here is
the only insect useful in all its habits,
having a fixed habitation accessible to
man, dependentuponth the pollen Of every
variety of flower as an indispensable
portion of the food of it's young, and
going to the bloom specifically to
gather that pollen, thus making pos
sible the marvellous fruit crops in
Washington and the Pacific Northwest.
That is why l say give the bee a
chance and it will literally break the
boughs of your trees with the weight
of fruit.
"Delve into the realm of applied
mechanics or structural engineering
and your research is incomplete until
a lesson is conned from the structure
of the %honeycomb with it's marvellous
strength as compared with the fragile
nature of it's fabric. No more mar
yelouS structure exists among the
myriad marvellous works of nature.
This waxen fabric, derived primarily
from liquid honey converted into wax
in that marvellous laboratory of the
bee, formed by some mysterious in
tinct or intelligence into the very form
of all others designed for economy of
materials, space and extremity of
strength, passes beyond the measure
of human skill in it's perfection.
Somewhere between 1744 and 1853
it was discovered that wax IS produced
between the plates on the lower side
of Che worker bees abdomen. 1t was
John Hunter, the celebrated aEatomist,
who discovered just how the bees
secrete wax, and thereby settling a
vexed question. He communicated his
discovery in a paper read to the Royal
Society of London, February %, 1893.
Wax is produced at the will of
the bee, and when called for by the
necessity of the hive. The waX-pro-
duCing beeSobtain a somewhat higher
temperature, usually by close cluster
ing. though they sometimes hang III
slender festOons and chains.
Wax is not chemically a fat or
gIvceride, and those who have called
it the fat of bee have grossly erred;
vet it is nearly allied to the fats III
atomic constitution, and the physiolo-
gical conditions favoring the forma-
tiol of one are curiOusly similar to
those aiding in the production of The
other. We put u poultry up to fat
in confinement, with part light; to
secure bodily inactivity We keep warm
and feed highly. Our bees, under
natures teachings, put themselves up
to yield wax under conditions so par
allel that the suitability Of the fatten-
ing o is indicated.
"Chesire in his Investigations says
that on the inner side of the eight
plates lining the lower side of the
abdomen are about 100000 glands,
from which the wax is secreted as a
white liquid, which hardens ON eX-
posture to the air.
1T is evident from the best author
it.y- that the form and method Of 4
secretion known as early as 1851. and
possibly even at an earlier date. The
G ordinary economy of the use of
wax shown by the fact that the hive
OF 5 to 10 gallons capacity will yield
but about two pounds Of wax when
melted. According to DR.. Denhoff the
thickness of the sides of a cell in a
new comb is only the 1850 part of
4I-. H. f,-I