s of Megachile keep to a single plant, or
has it a definite botanical domain wherein to exercise its liberty of
choice? The little that I have already said is enough to make us suspect
that the insect is not restricted to one plant; and this is confirmed
by an examination of the separate cells, piece by piece, when we find a
variety which we were far from imagining at first. Here is the flora
of the Megachiles in my neighbourhood, a very incomplete flora and
doubtless capable of considerable amplification by future researches.

The Silky Leaf-cutter gathers the materials for her pots, her lids and
her barricades from the following plants: paliurus, hawthorn, vine,
wild briar, bramble, holm-oak, amelanchier, terebinthus, sage-leaved
rock-rose. The first three supply the greater part of the leaf-work; the
last three are represented only by rare fragments.

The Hare-footed Leaf-cutter (Megachile lagopoda, LIN.) which I see very
busy in my enclosure, though she only collects her materials there,
exploits the lilac and the rose-tree by preference. From time to time,
I see her also cutting bits out of the robinia, the quince-tree and the
cherry-tree. In the open country, I have found her building with the
leaves of the vine alone.

The Silvery Leaf-cutter (Megachile argentata, FAB.), another of my
guests, shares the taste of the aforesaid for the lilac and the rose,
but her domain includes in addition the pomegranate-tree, the bramble,
the vine, the common dogwood and the cornelian cherry.

The White-girdled Leaf-cutter likes the robinia, to which she adds, in
lavish proportions, the vine, the rose and the hawthorn and sometimes,
in moderation, the reed and the whitish-leaved rock-rose.

The Black-tipped Leaf-cutter (Megachile apicalis, SPIN.) has for her
abode the cells of the Mason-bee of the Pebbles and the ruined nests of
the Osmiae and Anthidia in the Snail-shells. I have not known her to use
any other materials than the wild briar and the hawthorn.

Incomplete though it be, this list tells us that the Megachiles do not
have exclusive botanical tastes. Each species manages extremely well
with several plants differing greatly in appearance. The first condition
to be fulfilled by the shrub exploited is that it be near the
nest. Frugal of her time, the Leaf-cutter declines to go on distant
expeditions. Whenever I come upon a recent Megachile-nest, I am not long
in finding in the neighbourhood, without much searching, t