. American bee journal. Bee culture; Bees. April, 1915. American Hee Journal )>=^^^^ \ certain kinds of blossoms. This can- not be the case, since it exists in all sorts of countries with entirely differ- ent flora. The homes of well-to-do country people are scattered on the hill tops and make beautiful sights, as most of them are real castles, (^n our return from the Colantoni home we stopped at the country place of Dr. Marchetti, one of the leading beekeepers. I have never seen a more delightful country place; hidden among the trees, well shaded and surrounded with blooming gardens. Later
. American bee journal. Bee culture; Bees. April, 1915. American Hee Journal )>=^^^^ \ certain kinds of blossoms. This can- not be the case, since it exists in all sorts of countries with entirely differ- ent flora. The homes of well-to-do country people are scattered on the hill tops and make beautiful sights, as most of them are real castles, (^n our return from the Colantoni home we stopped at the country place of Dr. Marchetti, one of the leading beekeepers. I have never seen a more delightful country place; hidden among the trees, well shaded and surrounded with blooming gardens. Later we visited the apiary of Mr. Cotini, at his summer home. This is on the bluff overlooking the Adriatic, and in full view of the city. They had extracted the honey a few days before, but the crop was on again, and consid- able fresh honey showed in the supers. Here I saw an insect I had never yet seen, the death's-head moth (.Icheron- tia atrotos or Sphinx alropus), which many European writers mention as making great depredations in hives of bees. This one was dead, inside of the entrance of a colony. I noticed it as I walked in front of the hives and be- came so eager to get it that I forgot my usual prudence. I picked up a lit- tle stick and poked into the entrance to secure the moth. I did secure it, but angered the bees and got several stings for the first time since my arri- val in Italy. Unluckily it had been so badly damaged by the bees in their efforts to get rid of its carcass that it was of little value for a picture. So I offer our readers the copy of a wood- cut borrowed from the ancient work of Hamet, giving the moth at its nat- ural size. Until then, I could hardly believe that death's-head moths would be brave enough to enter a hive of bees to feed on its honey. But this was evidence ?which I could not gainsay. It appears that this moth fears the stings but lit- tle, and enters weak colonies to gorge upon their stores. Hamet says they can take as much as 60 gramn
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Keywords: ., bo, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1860, booksubjectbees, bookyear1861
