Abstract
THE Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 82, 1944, contains a very comprehensive memoir on the above subject, written by C. D. Michener, an assistant curator of the Museum. The method which the author has adopted is to make a detailed study of the morphology of a single species of bee, for example, Anthophora edwardsii, and then to compare numerous other bees with this species. Finally, with these comparisons as a basis, the author gives an account of the interrelationships of the various groups of bees followed by a general scheme of classification. The latter deals with all groupings, from families to genera, represented in America north of Mexico. The memoir is one intended for the specialist on the order Hymenoptera. The anatomical section is concerned with external organs and parts only; the internal organs and musculature being outside the scope of the work. A certain number of new terms are used including the expressions mesosoma and metasoma for the regions commonly referred to as thorax and abdomen respectively. Six families of bees are recognized. The Colletidæ and Halictidæ are the two oldest groups. The next in order of antiquity are considered to be the Andrenidæ and Apidæ followed doubtfully by the Megachilidæ. The last family—the Melittidæ—is too imperfectly known to suggest its position in the series. The largest family is the Apidæ which is held to include a large number of bees usually considered to be outside its limits. The author mentions that certain of these have often been placed in separate families largely on the basis of the presence or absence of the pygidial plate. This character is regarded as being unreliable since it is often lost in very different bees.
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Structure and Classification of Bees. Nature 154, 359–360 (1944). https://doi.org/10.1038/154359c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/154359c0