Honey-comb is a waxen cellular structure framed by the bees to deposit their honey and eggs in. The wax is secreted by the insect in the form of small and thin oval scales in the folds of the abdomen. The comb is composed of a number of cells, most of them exactly hexagonal, and arranged in two layers placed end to end, the openings of the layers being in opposite directions. The comb is placed vertically, the cells being therefore horizontal. The sides of the cells are very thin, and yet the whole structure is of considerable strength. Some cells are destined for the exclusive reception of honey; others for the reception of larvae. Research Honey-comb
The abdominales are a classification of fish, including the greater part of fresh-water fishes, and many marine ones, that have the ventral fins under the abdomen behind the pectorals. Research Abdominales
The agouti is a small rodent of the genus Dasyprocta, forming the family Dasyproctidae. There are eight or nine species found in the forests of Central and South America. The agouti is herbivorous, swift-running, and about the size of a rabbit, but resembling a slender-limbed pig, brown to yellow in colour with a white line along the abdomen. It burrows in the ground or in hollow trees, lives on vegetables, doing much injury to the sugar-cane, is as voracious as a pig, and makes a similar grunting noise. Its flesh is white and well tasted. Research Agouti
Amphipoda is an order of sessile-eyed crustaceans of the sub-class Malacostraca where the carapace is absent and the body is laterally compressed. The abdomen is elongated. Many species are found in springs and rivulets, others in salt water. The sand-hopper and shore-jumper are examples. Research Amphipoda
Aphis is a genus of insects (called plant-lice) of the order Hemiptera, the type of the family Aphides. The species are very numerous and destructive. The Aphis rosae lives on the rose; the Aphis fabae on the bean; the Aphis humuli is injurious to the hop, the Aphis granaria to cereals, the Aphis lanigera or woolly aphis equally so to apple-trees. The aphides are furnished with an inflected beak, and feelers longer than the thorax. In the same species some individuals have four erect wings and others are entirely without wings. The feet are of the ambulatory kind, and the abdomen usually ends in two horn-like tubes, from which is ejected the substance called honey-dew, a favourite food of ants. The aphides illustrate parthenogenesis; hermaphrodite forms produced from eggs produce viviparous wingless forms, which again produce others like themselves, and thus multiply during summer, one individual giving rise to millions. Winged sexual forms appear late in autumn, the females of which, being impregnated by the males, produce eggs. Research Aphis
Aplopus is a genus of some nineteen species of stick insect found in the Dominican Republic. They are between 120 and 170 mm long, green or brown in colour and the male has burgundy coloured wings which cover about two-thirds of his abdomen. When threatened, the male unfolds his wings. Research Aplopus
Araniella is a genus of spider. Araniella curcubitina is a common British species with a lime-green coloured abdomen patterned with yellow bands. Research Araniella
The Barbados Blackbelly is a breed of sheep, African in origin and developed on the island of Barbados. The Barbados Blackbelly has a variety of colour phases varying from basic black and tan colour through black, yellow, and variegated pinto patterns. The black colour covers the under parts completely in the basal pattern and extends up the neck with black extending down the inside of the legs, on the plank and back of the thighs. The inside hair of the ears is black with a small dash at the rear of the eye. The chin and poll are black. The black under parts and black lines medial to the eye contrasting with the normal tan to reddish coat in most other areas, gives an exotic contrasting appearance. Yellow ewes (pale to reddish yellow) have a white abdomen. The yellow colour phase may have been originally derived from a different breed of hair sheep.
There has also been noted a reddish, and also a white, hair sheep in northeastBrazil and light brown colours characteristic of hair sheep from Tobago. Further north there is a light to pale brown sheep in the Bahamas, the long island sheep in Cuba called the Pelibuey. All of these sheep are thought to be at least partially related to the Barbados Blackbelly. The mature rams have a neckpiece of long hair, up to six inches, which extends down the neck to the brisket. The cape reaches full development in the fall of the year. In some rams this is a full cape which extends over the sides and top of the neck and shoulders as a showy blanket. Rams and ewes on the island of Barbados are polled or with short scurs. Research Barbados Blackbelly
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Honey-comb
