蜂蜜有颜色

张超

To find out whether bees can see colors， the following experiment1 is made. A round table is put in a garden and on the table is a piece of blue cardboard2 with a drop of syrup3 on it. After a short time， bees come to the syrup. The bees then fly to their hive4 and give the syrup to the other bees in the hive. Then they return to the feeding-place which they have found. After a while， the blue cardboard with the syrup on it is taken away. Instead of this card， a blue card is now put on the left side of the first feeding-place and a red card to its right. These new cards have no syrup on them. Very soon bees arrive again， and fly straight to the blue card. None go to the red card. The experiment has proved5 that bees can see colors.

为了调查蜜蜂是否能够识别颜色，有人做了以下实验：在花园里放上一张圆桌，把一张粘有糖浆的蓝色硬纸板放在桌上。不久，蜜蜂被糖浆吸引过来了。接着蜜蜂飞向蜂房，把糖浆传给蜂房里的其他蜜蜂。然后，它们又飞回它们发现糖浆的地方。过一段时间，粘有糖浆的蓝色硬板被撤走了。我们用一张蓝色卡片和一张红色卡片把它替换掉，其中蓝色卡片放在第一次觅食的位置的左边，红色卡片放在右边。这些卡片上没有糖浆。很快蜜蜂又一次回来了，它们径直飞向了蓝色卡片，而没有一只蜜蜂飞向红色卡片。这个实验证明了蜜蜂能够识别颜色。