ABSTRACT
BEES’ activities are hindered if there are swarms of flies about, or by rainy weather. In the hives may be found a worm which spins a web, like a spider’s, tyrannizes over the whole colony, and makes the honey rot. 1 But, as Palladius writes at the beginning of Bk IV, you may quite easily rid the hives of this pest by fumigating them with dried cow-dung, collected in the spring, without injury to the bees. 2 3 There are also unsociable bees, which are lazy and fly through the spaces of the air pretending they are as busy as the worker bees, but return to the hives only to eat up the honey. However, these are killed and dragged outside by the worker bees, especially by the kings, whose duty it is to protect and guide their state with just laws. 3 Ambrose, in Bk V, Ch. 22, of the Hexameron, tells us that if anyone chances to spill oil over bees, they quickly expire, since their breathing passages are blocked and they are unable to take in air.
