. The honey bee: a manual of instruction in apiculture. Fig. 1.—Worker cellsof common East Indianhoney bee (Apisindica);natural size. (Original.) EAST INDIAN BEES. 13 THE TINY EAST INDIAN HONEY BEE.(Apis jlorea Fab.) This bee, also a native of East India, is the smallest known speciesof the genus. It builds in the open air, attaching a single comb to atwig of a shrub or small tree. This comb is only about the size of a manshand and is exceedingly delicate, there being oneach side 100 worker cells to the square inch ofsurface (figs. 2 and 3). The workers, more slen-der than house flies, though
. The honey bee: a manual of instruction in apiculture. Fig. 1.—Worker cellsof common East Indianhoney bee (Apisindica);natural size. (Original.) EAST INDIAN BEES. 13 THE TINY EAST INDIAN HONEY BEE.(Apis jlorea Fab.) This bee, also a native of East India, is the smallest known speciesof the genus. It builds in the open air, attaching a single comb to atwig of a shrub or small tree. This comb is only about the size of a manshand and is exceedingly delicate, there being oneach side 100 worker cells to the square inch ofsurface (figs. 2 and 3). The workers, more slen-der than house flies, though longer bodied, areblue-black in color, with the anterior third ofthe abdomen bright orange. Colonies of thesebees accumulate so little surplus honey as to giveno hope that their cultivation would be profit-able. THE GIANT EAST INDIAN HONEY (Apis dorsata Fab.) Fig 2__Worker celu of This large bee (Plate I, figs. 2 and 3), which ?*E*9t i»dian honey bee » v ° (Apis Jforea); natural size. might not be inappropriately styled the Giant (Original).East Indian bee, has its home also in the far East—both on the con-tinent of Asia and the adjacent islands. There are probably severalvarieties, more or less marked, of this species, and very likely Apiszonata Guer. of the Philippine Islands, reported to be even largerthan A. dorsata, will prove on further investigation to be only a varietyof the latter. All the varieties of these bees build huge combs of verypure wax—often 5 to G feet in length and 3 to 4 feet in width, whichthey attach to overhanging ledges of rocks or to large limbs of loftytrees in the primitive forests or jungles. When attached to limbs oftrees they are built singly and present much the same appearance asthose of the tiny East Indian bee, shown in the accompanying figure(fig. 3). The Giant bee, however, q
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