Some species of wasps take a little honey at times--more particularly when hives are opened--and they annoy the bees; others capture and eat workers, as do also the large ant-like "cow-killers" (Mutillidæ), and certain predaceous flies (Asilidæ), true bugs (Phymatidæ), and neuropterous and orthopterous insects (Libellulidæ and Mantidæ). The larvæ of certain beetles (Dermestidæ and Tenebrio) feed upon pollen and the cast-off skins of developing larvæ and pupæ, and certain of the Meloid larvæ attach themselves to the bodies of bees as parasites. Ants (Formicidæ) and cockroaches (Blattidæ), which gather above the quilts and between the quilts and the tops of the frames in order to be benefited by the warmth of the cluster of bees, sometimes help themselves to honey, and their presence annoys the bees more or less. Some of the insects here mentioned are only found locally, the predaceous ones being confined mainly to the South, while it may be said that the general welfare of strong colonies is not often materially affected nor the return noticeably reduced through the attacks of any of them. Spiders, toads, and lizards destroy, in addition to many injurious insects, also some bees, and should be tolerated in the vegetable garden rather than in the apiary. Swallows, kingbirds or bee martins, mice, skunks, and bears only occasionally commit depredations in the apiary. Properly constructed hives enable the bees to limit in a great measure the injury which these various enemies might inflict, and the avoidance of overswarming, with care to insure the constant presence of a prolific queen and a supply of food suited to the needs of the colony at the time, will keep it populous and therefore in shape to repel attacks or to make good most of the unavoidable losses. ROBBER BEES. Robbing is sometimes a more serious matter, although it very rarely happens that a little careful attention just at the right time on the part of the bee keeper would not avoid all serious trouble on this score. When bees find nothing to gather during weather when they can still fly out they are easily tempted to appropriate the stores of weaker colonies. Exposure of combs of honey at such times may even occasion a combined attack upon a good colony otherwise quite able to take care of itself. It is then that the greatest destruction ensues, for such a colony will defend itself vigorously, and a pitched battle, with perhaps fifty or sixty thousand Amazons on either side, leaves the ground literally strewn with dead and dying.