840 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



THE "WAYS OF BEEB. 



Editor Popular Science Monthly : 



DEAR SIR: I have read Prof. E. P. 

 Evans's article, on Progress in Lower 

 Animals, in your December number, and it 

 seems to mc that some of the statements 

 found therein call for the attention of a 

 practical apiarist. 



If all of tliem have no more foundation 

 in fact than have those relating to bees, 

 they furnish a very flimsy support upon 

 which to found any kind of an argument. 



I am well aware that there is a good 

 deal of nonsense written in the name of sci- 

 ence ; but I do not reu:ember having seen 

 60 many misrepresentations of facts, in the 

 same length of space, in any article I ever 

 read. 



The professor says : " Beehives which 

 suffer from overproduction rear a queen and 

 send forth with her a swarm of emigrants to 

 colonize, and the relations of the mother- 

 hive to her colonies are known " (by whom ?) 

 " to be much closer and more cordial than 

 those which she sustains to apian commu- 

 nities with which she has no genetic connec- 

 tion. Here the ties of kinship are as strongly 

 and clearly recognized as they are between 

 consanguineous tribes of men." 



It is true that bees rear queens and 

 swarm, but they do not rear a queen to send 

 forth with a " swarm of emigrants " ; for 

 the young queen is not out of her cell until 

 the old queen, her mother, is out of the 

 hive and gone with the new colony. The 

 "ties of kinship" are such that, should the 

 young queen issue from her cell before the 

 old one leaves the hive, she would usually 

 receive a fatal sting from her mother, not- 

 withstanding her " genetic connection," 

 whatever that may mean. And the first 

 young queen that gains her liberty is apt to 

 treat her younger sisters in the same way, 

 even before they have issued from their 

 cells. 



That the swarm after it has become set- 

 tled in its new home recognizes in any way 

 the relationship it bears to the old colony is 

 utterly absurd, and, as every practical apia- 

 rist knows, has no foundation in fact. 



The " ties of kinship " are not as " clear- 

 ly recognized as they are between consan- 

 guineous tribes of men." Nay, the very op- 

 posite is true. They are not recognized at 

 all after the swarm has become distinct and 

 separate from the colony remaining in the 

 hive, which is composed of the young bees 

 with the young queen. 



We are again told, " Bees readily sub- 

 stitute oatmeal for pollen, if they can get 

 it." Cccs can be taught to take ri/e-meal as 



a substitute for pollen when they can not ge 

 pollen, but neither Prof. Evans nor any one 

 else ever saw a colony of bees that would 

 take '■'■ oatmeaV in preference to follen. In 

 fact, they will not take rye-meal at all, if 

 they can get pollen. 



Ilowever, the above quotations are not 

 so bad as they might be, for they are harm- 

 less — that is, it will do no more injury for 

 the people to receive them as true than it 

 would for them to receive any other inno- 

 cent absurdity in the name of science. Had 

 it not been for the statement which follows, 

 I should not have felt called upon to point 

 out these mistakes of the professor. But, 

 in further support of his argument, he tells 

 his readers that " apiarists now provide their 

 hives with .artificial combs for the storage of 

 honey, and the bees seem glad to be relieved 

 from making cells, as their predecessors 

 had done." Apiarists do not " provide 

 their hives with artificial combs," but they 

 do sometimes fill the frames of their hives 

 with comb foundation ; but this is the real 

 stuff- — beeswax — in thin sheets with an im- 

 print corresponding to the cells. This is 

 not " artificial comb," and the bees are not 

 " relieved from making cells." They have 

 the cells to build, the same as they do when 

 they secrete the wax in their own bodies, 

 out of which the combs are formed. The 

 modern apiarist furnishes the wax, and 

 saves the time and labor of the bees that 

 would be required to secrete it ; but nothing 

 but wax will do, and some colony of bees 

 had to secrete that wax. It can not be 

 made by any " artificial " process. 



I hardly think that there is any evidence 

 that the bees are " glad " to get this wax. 

 We only know that they will use it. 



Some years ago Prof. Wiley wrote what 

 he afterward called a " scientific pleasantry " 

 for The Popular Science Monthly, if I am 

 correct, in which he described how " arti- 

 ficial comb " was made and filled with imi- 

 tation honey, and declared that an expert 

 could not distinguish it from the genuine 

 stuff. He thus gave currency to what has 

 become known among apiarists as the 

 " Wiley lie," of which Prof. Evans's state- 

 ment seems to be an echo. 



You have no idea, Mr. Editor, how much 

 injury this little " pleasantry " has done the 

 bee-keepers of this land. For, notwithstand- 

 ing the fact that Prof. Wiley has explained, 

 over his own signature, that this was only a 

 joke, and A. I. Root, of Medina, Ohio, has 

 offered one thousand dollars for a single 

 pound of the comb, which has not been forth- 

 coming, yet the papers and the people go on 

 repeating this slander on an honest and 

 reputable industry. 



