Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 41, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 March 1909 — HOW FLOWERS HIDE HONEY. [ARTICLE]

HOW FLOWERS HIDE HONEY.

Pit# Where Sweets Are Btored in Lily —Concealed Nectar of Monkshood. Before “the bee sucks," as Ariel put it* he must find the wonderful places where the flowers hide away their honey, to be found like the priests' hiding holes in ancient mansions, by the right sort of visitor, and to keep away all intruders. . In the recesses of the crown imperial lily at'the centre can: be seen six large honey* pits, one on every flora) leaf, and each is brlmining over with a big drop. Shake the flower and it “weeps” as the big drops fall from it, soon to be replaced by other tears Ip the rapidly secreting flower. Tlie simple folk call the flower “Job’s tears.” The snowdrop is literally flowing with honey, for in swollen veins traversing Its fragile whiteness are rivers of nectar. The petals of the columbine are Ingeniously and elaborately designed with a view to providing good places ot hiding for the honey. ‘ Each is circular, hollow, shaped like a horn. In each the honey is secreted in a round knob at what would be the mouthpiece end of the horn, and the five are arranged in-a rtng side by side with the honey knobs adoft Though the honey store is obvious from without, yet the insects who would sip It must creep into the flower and penetrate with a long nose up the curving horn to the knob. Sometimes the petals are all joined together into a tube and. the sweet nectar simply exudes from the Inner side of the wall and Collects at the bottom. This is the case in the dead nettle, the tube of which forms so toothsome a morsel that some children call It "suckles." The honeysuckle is similarly planned, and its sweetness is so striking as to have furnished its name. The monkshood has quaint nectaries. If the hood be drawn back there suddenly spring into sight two objects on long stalks which are sometimes like a French horn, sometimes like a cowl, or, looked at sideways, not unlike a pair of doves. Their presence within the hood has provided the nicknames "Adam and Eve” and “Noah’s Ark." Thus the honey bags are carefully flicked away and protected.—Chicago Tribune.