Elementary textbook of economic zoology and entomology . elementarytextbo00kell Year: [c1915] WASPS, ANTS AND BEES 205 of larvae of insects are among the ants' most liked edibles, says Miss Field. The extremely highly developed instincts of the social Hymenoptera (social wasps, social bees and ants) have led to their being called the most intelligent of insects. But as far as our present knowledge goes we are not justified in attributing any intelligence, in the strict meaning of the term, to any insects. Their behavior is practically wholly controlled by inherited instincts, which fit them t
Elementary textbook of economic zoology and entomology . elementarytextbo00kell Year: [c1915] WASPS, ANTS AND BEES 205 of larvae of insects are among the ants' most liked edibles, says Miss Field. The extremely highly developed instincts of the social Hymenoptera (social wasps, social bees and ants) have led to their being called the most intelligent of insects. But as far as our present knowledge goes we are not justified in attributing any intelligence, in the strict meaning of the term, to any insects. Their behavior is practically wholly controlled by inherited instincts, which fit them to go through a certain life FIG. 93.—Plan of the Fielde ant-nest, ten inches by six inches, a, En- trance and exit to food-rooms (i); 2, nursery; 3, sponge-room; b, screens; m, passage. routine very effectively, but which leave them helpless if by any chance they are submitted to wholly new conditions. Much experimental work has been done with the wasps, bees and ants, to test their capacities for successful modifications of their behavior, and the weight of authority is against admitting their possession of real reason or intelligence. In this connec- tion the books of Fabre, the French 'Homer of insect life,' those of the Peckhams, American students of solitary and social wasps, and of Wheeler, the American student of ants, should be read by students. They contain the most fascinat- ing stories of insect life which can be written.
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