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Show THE RICH COUNTY REAPER, RANDOLPH, UTAH WHATS BEHIND THE WAR IN CHINA Japanese Seek New Wealth They Failed to Find in Manchukuo; Chinese Are Not Yet Ready for Unified Resistance. How Germans Protect Bee Hives. How the Honey Bee Lives and Performs His Very Important Duties Prepared by National Geographic Society, Washington, D. C. WNU Service. does the average know of the active life of the honey bee which in summer is conspicuous flying from flower to flower, .bear- LITTLE ing pollen that plants may blossom and bear fruit in sea- son. The young queen bee, a few cotton crop of China, which is third days $fter leaving the hive in in the worlds production; but Chi- which she has been born, sena began to restrict her cotton lects a day for her wedding exports to Japan and left the latter She flight. usually choosers a in a bad way. Circled on the map above are the five North China provinces which may be the next step in Japanese expansion. By WILLIAM C. UTLEY is an ambitious nation and a needy one. Her ambition governmental and economic leadership of Asia, or at JAPAN eastern Asia. Her needs are territory for an Suiyan and Chahar are extremely population, raw materials that her own islands cannot produce in sufficient quantity, markets for her manufactured important to Japans military strategy, for they would act as an goods and adequate defense against her enemies. efficient buffer along the left flank This is why you read every few of her Asiatic front, greatly years or even every few months strengthening her position on the 1931 she has poured inSince rials. of a new war scare in North China. mainland. Sometimes it is not merely a scare, but an actual war, even as today, whether war has been officially declared or not. Always upon the Chinese who oppose her gradual expansion, Japan wreaks a vengeance which to us across the Pacific often seems all out of proportion to the aggression committed by opposing her. But after each of these retributions she is found, when the smoke and flames clear away, to have assumed domination or even actual control over one more piece of ter- ritory. I1 Just how much more her influence will be extended after the present conflict has died out it is impossible to say. Indeed, that ipay depend upon the degree of opposition she meets. If the ChiAese national government at Nanking, g under the dictatorship of Gen. decides to let the twenty-nint- h army carry the main burden of defense, Japan will probably emerge with nothing more than an extension of control to covarea and er the Peiping-Tientsi- n part of the province of Chahar. If, however, a China now more united than at any time since the downfall of the Manchu dynasty decides to come en masse to the aid of the Chi-an- Kai-she- k, twenty-nint- h army, Japan may at- tempt to punish China to terrible degree. Successful in this, Japan would probably extend her dominance throughout all the five northern provinces and virtually all of China south of the Yellow river valley. Japans Westward March. k does throw the If Chiang full strength of China at Japan, it will be a fight to the death. For Kai-she- the Japanese are full of that strange oriental pride which per- mits no loss of prestige. They will fight China to the bitter end before they will submit to a comproDeath bemise on their demands. fore dishonor I is more than a slogan with them. It is a law of nature as inexorable as the law of v gravity. The fighting in North China today is but another step in Japans Earlier steps westward march. were those which resulted in control, tantamount to annexation, over the Chinese provinces of Manchuria and Jehol. For a short time after those steps were taken Japan marked time, strengthening her hold upon these provinces, and fortifying her front against Russia, the eternal enemy. Manchukuo was supposed to open up vast, new and desirable horizons. Japans population of 70,000,-00- 0 was growing at the rate of 1,000,000 a year; her people needed more room and more raw mate V vestments totaling 1,400,000,000 yen into the puppet state. Some results were forthcoming soy beans and kaolaiang, chemicals, slight increases in iron ore and coal, and a good increase in oil shale but these fell far short of Nippons hopes. Manchukuo was supposed to open up a great new market for Japa- nese manufactured goods; but the increase in exports to the United States for 1935 over 1934 was equal d to of the total exports to As a new home for Manchukuo. colonists Manchukuo was Japanese pretty much of a flop; less than 250,000 Japanese live there today. It was apparent that Japan could not, in pursuing her hegemonic policy, continue marking time for very long. In North China were larger fields for her exports; in addition, the area was that much closer to the great market of China proper. So the Japanese began to cast covetous eyes upon Hopei, which includes the cities of Peiping and Tientsin; Chahar, which lies between Mongolia and Manchukuo; Shansi and Shantung. Suiyuan, They penetrated (peacefully, to be sure) through Hopei and Chahar, until these two became practically states. one-thir- self-governi- Spirit Grows. In Hopeis eastern countries, Japanese influence blossomed into a virtual protectorate. But when it reached a certain point Japans peaceful invasion was halted. With the rise of Chiang the Chinese were developing a new unity, although they were not nearly so unified as our states are, for instance. Yet the spirit was becoming more widespread and more open. It probably culminated in the skirmish between Chinese and Japanese at Marco Polo bridge," the incident which gave rise to the present grave crisis? It is assumed by many observers in the Far East that the incident was seized upon by Nippon as an excuse for further Japanese invasion on the pretext of 'retaliation, which would extend Japanese control over the five North China states and even to the south, eventually. Others contend that Japans immediate objective is the strengthening of her grip on Hopei and Chahar. Yet it cannot be overlooked that the other three provinces hold rich prizes for Toyyo. Shansi contains more than half of all the coal in China; the other northern provinces are capable of great cotton production for Japanese industries and for the manufacture of gunpowder, so essential to a militant nation. Japan once imported the bulk of the Anti-Japane- se Kai-she- k, anti-Japane- se On the other side of these provinces lies Sovietized Mongolia. The terrain of Suiyuan and Chahar, partly included in the Gobi desert, is wild and difficult, and without satisfactory transportation facilities. It would take only a small, Japanese army to well-train- ed pre- vent penetration by the Russians and to prevent, the spread of communism. Further, the Japanese, in possession of these two provinces, could then put an end to their use as a base for communist guerilla warfare against Manchukuo and Jehol. Railroads Key to Control. On the peninsula of Shantung are the rich Yellow river valley and the ports of Chefoo, Weihaiwei and Tsingtao. With Hopei and Shansi, Shantung forms the transportation center of North China. In possession of the peninsula Japan would be in a position to control the Gulf of Chihli and the Yellow sea. Key to domination of China is its railroad system. Who controls the railroads can control the territory they serve. It may be seen upon the accompanying map how the railroads of North China radiate from the area about Peiping and Tientsin. Once Japan is in complete control of this area her influence could follow the rails to the important city of Kalgan in Chahar, and from there to Paotow in Suiyuan; into the southwest over the Peiping-Hankorailway to and southern Hopei, and to Taiyuan in Shansi; southward from Tientsin to Tsangchow and across the Yellow ' river to Tsinan, thence southward again to Nanking itself and eastward to the port of Tsingtao. These railroads, in addition to one across Hopei from Tsangchow to Shihkiachiang which the Japanese wish to build if they can get the permission of China, are of tremendous military importance. As this is being written Gen. k is faced with a deChiang cision that China has had to make again and again since the Japanese awakened to the necessity for expansion. Shall he declare open warfare against Japan, or shall his national government continue to make feeble protests while the local troops of the North defend their country ineffectively, as they are wont to do? Local Chinese forces in Hopei and Chahar are not equal to the task of repulsing the Japanese, even though every last man is ready to lay down his life. Probably he will decide to let the Japanese have what they want, just as they took what they , wanted in Manchuria and Jehol. w Shih-kiachia- Kai-she- ' Western Newspaper Union. ng clear, warm, quiet day because her honeymoon is short, and she must make the most of it. Only when she leaves the hive with a swarm, probably a year hence, will she have another occasion to fly. Mating always takes place on the wing, and if conditions are such that the queen cannot fly she will die a virgin. The strongest drone is her mate, for the queen is a good flyer, and the weak are thus eliminated in this wise provision to maintain the strength and vigor of - the race. Before the queen has had time to return to the hive after the mating flight, the drone will have fallen to the earth, dead. Because of her specialized duties and the fact that she does not engage in outside work and is not subject to the hazards of weather and enemies that might prey upon her, the queen may live to the ripe old age of three or four years. When she becomes too old, or when she can no longer produce queen and worker bees, or if she becomes accidentally crippled, the bees will raise another queen to replace her and for a while both mother and daughter may work side by side in the hive. But this arrangement does not last long. The old queen will shortly disappear. The marked differences between the queen and worker bee, both of whom come from the same kind of fertilized egg, have already been mentioned. Their difference in behavior is even more pronounced. The worker bee is armed with a straight sting, the end of which is barbed like a harpoon. When a worker bee stings, it cannot disengage its sting. The violent effort of tearing itself loose from the sting so severely damages the tissue of its body that it dies within a few minutes. When Rival Queens Battle. The sting of the queen, instead of being straight and barbed, is smooth and curved. It is constructed so that it can easily be withdrawn when she uses it. The queen seemingly does not realize that she possesses this very effective weapon. She may be picked up and handled as harmlessly as a kitten. If the queen gets into the wrong hive in returning from her mating flight, a royal battle is sure to ensue, and the two queens fight it out until death comes to the weaker. If the queen used her sting indiscriminately, she might easily lose her life in meeting an enemy with which she could not cope. If she were being handled by her keeper and attempted to free herself by stinging him, he might instinctively retaliate by crushing her frail body. Should he do so, it would jeopardize the future life of" the colony, especially if there were no larvae in the hive from which a successor could be raised. 0 Fo her protection therefore, she depends upon her own daughters or sister workers. well-anchore- d. The drone ysually is regarded as a lazy individual, but, after all, he is the father and is entitled to certain respect. He gathers no food, nor does he help defend the family ; he has no tools to collect sweets nor has he a sting to defend even himself. During his brief existence, however, he has certain privileges not accorded his sisters. He caq safely visit neighboring colonies.; Neither workers nor queens are accepted in other hives, but during the breeding season drones are allowed to come and go as they please. Know One Another by Smell. The person who can recall the nafftes and faces of several hundred acquaintances is unusual; yet in a family of 80,000 individuals the bee instantly recognizes every member. It is evident that recognition is not through the sense of sight; instead, it is effected by the more highly developed sense of smell. Every colony has a distinctive family odor, different from that of every other colony. If a strange bee attempts to enter a hive, the guards at the entrance detect its alien odor and drive it away. When a colony is divided into two parts, the parts placed in separate hives and given queens that are sisters, the bees in each half develop different odors. Within a weeks time they become total strangers to each other. Were the halves united again, the bees would disregard the existence of any relationship. If it becomes necessary to place a new queen in a colony, it is essential that she be properly introduced. The old queen is removed at least an hour before the newcomer is presented. In this interval the colony discovers that it is queenless and it may start constructing new queen cells. Even though the colony desires a queen, it would not do to release the usurper, because her strange odor would antagonize the bees and endanger her life. She is placed in a wire cage to protect her from assaults. Although her new subjects would kill her were she suddenly released, they feed her by inserting their ; tongues through the meshes of the wire. Mast Store Food for Winter. Honeybees help perpetuate their race by their insatiable desire to gather nectar. Unlike bumblebees, hornets, yellow jackets, and wasps, honeybees cannot live from hand to mouth. They must store enough food during the summer to keep the colony alive throughout the winter. Of the four other insects just mentioned, all .the individuals in each colony die at the approach of winter except the young mated queens, and these simply crawl into 7 protected places where they hibernate. During this period they R. equire no food. Among honeybees, only the drones die in the fall. The queen and the workers live and are semiactive throughout the winter. It is important, therefore, to gather enough food during the summer to' maintain the colony during seasons when insect activity largely ceases. At the end of the swarming season, which coincides with the height of the breeding season, the queen lays fewer and fewer eggs until fall, when the rearing of the brood entirely ceases. Cold weather has overtaken the colony by this time, imposing changes in its organization to cope with low temperatures. Individual honeybees die of chill at temperatures well above freezing; in fact, they seldom fly. when the temperature is lower than. 45 degrees Fahrenheit.'" |