The honey-bee: its nature, homes and products

General Facts connected with Swarming--Reconnoitring-- Settling--Hiving--Curious Incidents--Transferring Swarms to Bar-Frame Hives--Division of Swarms--Placing Swarm in Permanen...

Superstitions likely to gather around Bees--Unlucky to Buy Bees--Ill Omen for a Swarm to Settle on a Dry Stick-- "Have the Bees been told?"--Turning Hives on the Death of the Ow...

"The most remarkable function of the sting-apparatus has, in modern times, been discovered to be the insertion of a minute drop of the poison in each honey-cell when filled. Thi...

Far back in historic time there are records that man had learnt the value of the bee. The book of Job--probably the oldest of our sacred Scriptures--contains a reference to hone...

It will be observed from the title of this book that it deals with the honey-bee. The necessity of this restriction will become immediately evident when we mention the fact that...

One of the earliest facts ascertained in the study of bees was that there existed in each colony one individual differing considerably from all the rest in appearance and in fun...

The drones are the male population of the bee-community. In general form they are more cylindrical than the queens or workers. They are shorter than the former, but larger and m...

The workers are by far the most numerous, and, in some sense, the most important party in the commonwealth of bees. They are smaller in size than either queens or drones. Micros...

Honey is mainly derived from the nectar of flowers. We say mainly, because bees are able to make use of many sweet liquids, such as the juices of ripe fruits, the substances con...

The sugar of various vegetables is susceptible of alcoholic fermentation; so from the sugar of malt we get beer, from that of the grape, wine. Honey is, as we have said, a subst...

It was long thought that wax was a product derived, like honey, immediately from flowers. Not only did popular ignorance suppose that the pellets of pollen carried on the thighs...

Honey consists, like most saccharine substances, of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen. It is fitted, therefore, as a food to supply the waste in the body of the bee produced by respi...

Another substance carried in, and largely used by the bees, is an exceedingly sticky material called propolis, from two Greek words signifying "before the city," as it was obser...

Before proceeding to detail the most important facts connected with the internal economy of the hive, it will be desirable to describe with some minuteness the physiology and an...

With regard to the sense of hearing, Sir John Lubbock says: "The result of my experiments on the hearing of bees has surprised me very much. It is generally considered that, to...

The thorax of the bee is divided into three sections, or imperfect rings. Of these, that nearest the head is called the _pro_-thorax, the middle one the _meso_-thorax, and the h...

The abdomen constitutes the largest and hindmost segment of the body, and is important as containing several structures which have most essential functions in the economy of the...

How far the diseases of domesticated animals are due to the conditions to which they are subjected by man, and which are always, to some extent, contrary to the natural mode of...

It might well be imagined that creatures armed with such deadly weapons as bees, would have few enemies who would dare to contend with them. The fact is, however, that they are...

In a state of nature bees avail themselves of hollow trees, crevices in rocks, or other cavities of various kinds. Swarms escaped from apiaries will frequently find an entrance...

General Facts connected with Swarming--Reconnoitring--Settling-- Hiving--Curious Incidents--Transferring Swarms to Bar-Frame Hives--Division of Swarms--Placing Swarm in Permanen...

There are some mortifying incidents connected with natural swarming, which the skilled apiarian will endeavour to avoid, by taking the matter of the making of colonies into his...

The breeding of queens can only be done with ease and complete success in bar-frame hives. If, on examination of the frames of a stock, queen-cells with brood in them are found,...

We have already spoken of the advantages consequent on feeding swarms for a few days after they emerge, especially if the weather should be wet, cold, or dull. It is even more i...

The honey-bee differs from nearly all the wild varieties, as well as from hornets and wasps, in being adapted to live always in societies. Most other insects of the hymenopterou...

There are some personal requisites, in addition to what is called "bee-dress," if immunity from attack is to be secured. The first of these are, calmness and self-control. Many...

Certain difficulties surround the question of the emotions exhibited by the lower orders of animals; since it is easy for imagination, or, at least, the interpretative faculty o...

There has been a singular unwillingness on the part of many religious writers to acknowledge among animals inferior to man the possession of true intellectual faculties. This ha...

The connection between insects and the plant-world, and the mutual benefits they render, have long been known to man. While the one kingdom is almost entirely dependent on the o...

Superstitions likely to gather around Bees--Unlucky to Buy Bees--Ill Omen for a Swarm to Settle on a Dry Stick--"Have the Bees been told?"--Turning Hives on the Death of the Own...

In our introduction, reference was made to the money-returns likely to be derived from bee-keeping by persons of ordinary good sense, who learn to manage their hives according t...