. Elementary entomology. Insects. ^M'WiL, «MUii-«W»W £& rsSy flight into the ; The larger carpenter-bee (Xylocopa virginica} closely resembles a bumble-bee, being fully as large, yellow and black in color, with a metallic blue reflection on the abdomen. It excavates its nests in solid wood, often boring for a foot or more. Many of the long-tongued bees are known as guest-bees, from their habit of laying their eggs in the cells of other bees, which rear the larvae of the intruders as they do their own. The largest of these (Psythirus) so closely resemble bumble-bees that it is
. Elementary entomology. Insects. ^M'WiL, «MUii-«W»W £& rsSy flight into the ; The larger carpenter-bee (Xylocopa virginica} closely resembles a bumble-bee, being fully as large, yellow and black in color, with a metallic blue reflection on the abdomen. It excavates its nests in solid wood, often boring for a foot or more. Many of the long-tongued bees are known as guest-bees, from their habit of laying their eggs in the cells of other bees, which rear the larvae of the intruders as they do their own. The largest of these (Psythirus) so closely resemble bumble-bees that it is difficult to distinguish them from the males, though the females are readily recognized from their lacking the pollen-basket borne by the hind-legs of the bumble-bees. Just why they are tolerated is a mystery, for the bumble-bees allow them to go in and out of their nests with the greatest freedom. The social bees include our common bumble-bee and the domesticated honey-bees. The bumble-bees are of considerable importance to the farmer, for they are the only ones whose tongues are long enough to feed FIG. 431- Nest of bumble-bee (Bombns on red-clover blossoms, SO that sp.), showing opening at the surface of they are entirely responsible for the ground and also brood cells in the its pollination, and where they cavity beneath . rr are scarce it is difficult to secure (Adapted from McCook by Kellogg) f . a crop of clover seed. It is hardly necessary to describe the nest of a bumble-bee, for what country boy does not look back upon the stirring experiences in- cident to the robbing of their nests, or of accidentally disturbing one while mowing, and being given good reason to remember the fact. The queens are larger than the males or workers, and are the only forms which live over winter. In the spring the queen finds some deserted mouse nest and within it places a ball of pol- len and her eggs. The larvae feed on the pollen and, when full. Please note that these images are ex
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