Sting
in botany, a stinging hair.
Stinging hairs are sharp, stiff hairs, containing an acrid fluid which is injected into the wound which they produce; stimuli. Example, the nettle, in which the apex is expanded into a little bulb which is broken off when the sting is slightly touched.
In entomology, a weapon of defense, concealed within the abdomen of bees, wasps, etc., and capable of exsertion, or forming part of the last joint of the tail in scorpions. The sting of the bee ap- STING pears to the naked eye a simple needleshaped organ; but the microscope shows that it is formed of three pieces: A short short, stout, cylindrico-conical sheath containing two setæ, or lancets, one edge thickened and furnished with teeth directed backward, the other sharp and cutting. The poison apparatus consists of two glandular elongated sacs, and terminates by one or two excretory ducts.
Morphologically viewed, a sting is an altered oviduct. The term sting is sometimes inaccurately used for the bite of a venomous serpent, and of the forked tongue of snakes. See SCORPION.