The Lore of the Honey-Bee

by Tickner Edwardes

One of the most difficult things to observe in bee-life is the actual process of comb-building. The crush is so great, and the movement of the bees so incessant, that at first the comb seems to grow of itself rather than be made by the busy multitude, for ever obscuring it from the watcher’s eyes, or giving him but the rarest glimpse now and then of its white, delicate frailty of pattern. These early efforts of the comb-builders, produced as they are under forced circumstances, are occasionally faulty of design, as though hastily knocked together. Sometimes the first groups of cells made by a swarm will have a yellow, moist, spongy appearance, with thick, irregular walls, and are obviously little more than temporary vats to hold the incoming nectar until the proper honey-cells can be constructed. This emergency-comb is specially interesting, as affording one more instance of the worker-bee’s ever-ready resource in the presence of difficulties. In the ordinary way the mason-bee hangs quietly in the cluster until her wax-secreting organs have done their work, and the six little oblong scales of brittle material are ready for manipulation. These protrude from under the hard plates of her abdomen, three on each side, looking much like half-posted letters. At one of the knee joints of her hind-leg she has a peculiar implement, of which there is not the slightest trace in the queen-bee. This is like a pair of nippers, but instead of two converging points, it is furnished on one side with a row of sharp, stiff bristles; and on the other with a shallow spoon. With this special tool the worker-bee grips the wax-scale, and draws it out of its pocket. It is then transferred to her jaws, and she hurries off with it to the comb-building. Arrived at an unfinished cell, she sets to work to chew up the raw wax into a paste, incorporating it with her saliva, and materially increasing its bulk. The resulting soft, ductile matter is then applied to the work, and moulded into its needed shape. In this way, with hundreds of workers going and coming, the delicate white fabric of brood and honey-comb is built up with extraordinary rapidity.

How the coarse, spongy comb, which swarms will sometimes manufacture, is produced cannot be definitely stated. It has all the appearance of having been made from raw wax, hurriedly masticated and kneaded up with honey, and probably this is its actual composition. The secretion from the salivary gland, is necessarily slow, and with time pressing and a horde of impatient foragers dinning about her ears, eager to unload and be off again to the clover, the ingenious mason-bee appears to have hit on the idea of using the contents of her honey-sac as a substitute. Nothing, however, but a mechanical admixture can take place between honey and the raw wax. This dissolves only under the influence of the bee’s saliva, which has intensely acid properties.

To understand all that the bees have accomplished when a new empty hive has been filled throughout with waxen comb, it is necessary to follow the operations of the swarm pretty closely during the first few weeks of its separate life. It is a big undertaking, the building of an entire, new bee-city, and the problems that confront the builders are many and complicated. In the first place, whether she ever attains it or not, the worker-bee will aim at nothing short of perfection. Hereditary experience tells her exactly what are the home-requirements of the colony, and she now sets to work to fulfil them in the best imaginable way.

A city is to be built which is to accommodate twenty or thirty thousand individuals. Vast nursery-quarters must be constructed, as there may be as many as ten or twelve thousand youngsters to cradle at one and the same time. For at least six months of the year no food will be obtainable from outside, so that the city must contain large storehouses capable of holding more than a six months’ supply. As the temperature in winter can be kept up only by the bodily warmth of the inhabitants, life in the city must be concentrated into the smallest possible space; and the materials of which the city is built must be heat-conserving, while its construction must allow of perfect ventilation at all times, and in summer it must permit a free circulation of air, that the surplus heat can be readily carried off. The city must be a fortress as well as a home, and be closed in on every side as a protection against its many enemies, as well as the weather.

There is another, and just as vital a condition governing its construction—the necessity for strict economy in material. If there were any natural substance having the qualities of tenacity, lightness, ductility, and strength which the bees could obtain out of doors instead of wax, no doubt they would use it for comb-building, and they would not spend hours of precious time and consume large quantities of hard-won stores in the manufacture of their own material. But it seems there is nothing in nature possessing the needful properties. Bees collect a resinous substance, notably from the buds of the poplar, which they use for stopping up crevices. They dilute this also into a varnish, with which they paint the finished combs, and sometimes even combine it with wax to form a rough filling; but it appears to be useless in cell-construction. The whole city must needs be made of wax, and wax alone; and the bees are as careful of this precious substance as a miser of his gold.

Starting with these conditions—efficient house-accommodation for the colony secured at the least cost in time, labour, and material—the bee tackles the problem before her with an ingenuity that is little short of astounding. She appears to begin with the central dominant unit of the difficulty, and to work outward, vanquishing subsidiary problems as she goes. Her line of reasoning seems to run somewhat in this way. To raise the young, and store the honey, there is needed some kind of cell or receptacle. The young larvæ being cylindrical in form, a cylindrical cell is indicated; and this shape will serve also for the honey-barrels. Not a few, however, but many thousands of these vessels will be required: they must therefore be placed close together, as well for economy of space as for natural warmth. The cells could be grouped together mouth upwards in horizontal planes, storey above storey; but such a method of construction would be economically unsound. To prevent sagging in the heat of the hive, and under the weight they will be called to bear, the cell-bases would have to be thickened collectively into a substantial floor, which would need shoring-up at intervals—after the manner of the wasps. But in this, much valuable material would be diverted from its proper use. Obviously, a better plan would be to lay all the cells on their sides, and pile them up into a vertical wall. And, just as obviously, if two walls of these superimposed cells were placed back to back, so that one central vertical sheet of wax would serve to stop the ends of all the cells, right and left, a saving of half the material used for the cell-bottoms would at once be effected.

But, so far, the design is still only in its crude, initial stage. The upright comb, consisting of a double pile of round cells, back to back, with one flat base between, although a great advance on the single sheet of horizontal cells, is yet mechanically and economically deficient. The round cells leave useless interstices, which take much wax in the filling; while the flat bottoms do not coincide with the form of the larvæ, and thus still more space is wasted. Clearly, improvement can only come by altering the shape of the cell; and now the bee seems to have asked herself-and triumphantly answered—an extremely complex question.

She knew how much internal cell-space each larva required for growth. The problem, therefore, was this: of what shape, nearly approaching the cylindrical, ought such a cell to be made, which would ensure the right dimensions, but which would occupy the least possible room, have the greatest possible strength, consume the least possible material in its manufacture, and possess the property that a number of similar cells could be built up in a double vertical plane, leaving no interstices either between the cells or between the planes?

There is only one solution to this problem; and the honey-bee found it—who shall say how many ages ago?—in the hexagon cell, with its base composed of three rhombs.

The whole astounding ingenuity of the thing can only be realised when a piece of nearly perfect, new-made, virgin-comb has been closely examined. It will be at once seen that the hexagon cells combine together over the surface of the comb in absolute geometrical union, and that the six-sided form is round enough for all practical purposes. Looking into the cells on one side of the comb, it will be noted that their bases take the form of depressed pyramids, each made up of three diamond-shaped planes.