AJSr ARTICLE ON BEES. 



AN ARTICLE ON BEES. 



BY H. K. O., LAWRENCE, MASS. 



Mr. Downing — Your bee correspondent may be assured from my " experience," of 

 the fact that a queen bee has been produced from a worker's egg. I use the common 

 phraseology. The working bees are barren females; the queen the only fertile bee of the 

 hive. If she be lost, or dies, and there be worms [larva] of some three or four days old, 

 which, under ordinary circumstances, Would become workers and barren, the bees select 

 one, and by some treatment which no one has yet satis%ctorily explained, so develop its 

 organs as to render them generative — and such bee becomes the mother and queen, so 

 called. 



The subject is full of difficulties. For not only is the generative power of such bee 

 changed — but her shape, length of body, and sting. The various writers on the subject great- 

 ly disagree. Let me refer to " Bevan on the Honey Bee," and " Huish on Bees," and 

 " Miner on Bees and Hives." In these works the subject is fully treated. The proba- 

 bility is, that, as in most contested cases, the truth lies between the parties, and not 

 wholly on one side. 



Some years since, in a single combed hive made for the purpose, an apiarian friend and 

 myself witnessed the experiment. The queen of the swarm, from the nature of the hive, 

 could easily be seen at any time. She was killed by a stab with a long knitting needle. 

 In the course of a few hours the bees were found in great commotion, and continued so for 

 most of the day. When quiet, it was found that a small knot of bees was clustered round 

 a spot near the center of the comb, — and here they continued, till at the end of about four- 

 teen days a queen was seen to emerge from the cell at which they had operated. Whether 

 the worm was a Avorm, which, if let alone, and no queen were wanted, Avould have pro- 

 duced a worker, or whether it was a queen-worm, and which, (whether a queen Avere 

 wanted or not,) would have been a queen, I leave to the theorists to settle. Of the fact 

 that a queen was had, your correspondent may be assured. 



To his second query, I cannot reply practically, but should by all means recommend the 

 parting of the hive, and the removal of one of the parts to at least a mile's distance. 



To his third query, I reply that the bees in that part of the hive which contains the 

 queen, will, (whether it be the part carried off or the part remaining at home,) be quiet and 

 easy, and keep about their regular business; while the bees in the part which has not the 

 queen, will soon become troubled and uneasy, and begin to run about and travel over the 

 combs in great agitation, as if in search of the queen. This they will do for some hours, 

 until they settle down under the necessity of the case, and get to work on the process of 

 procurhig their new queen. 



Your correspondent appears to keep his bees in a city; now, although I have known 

 bees to do pretty well in town, they do much better in the country. The temptations of 

 the town lead many bees, as well as many bipeds, into dangerous and deadly places. In 

 the early and warm spring, before the honey-yielding flowers have blossomed, and in the 

 late summer, after they have withered, — the sAveet odors of the confectionary shops, of 

 the sugar and molasses stores, allure the industrious wanderers, and they, improvident 

 against the danger, and supposing that they can get out of the door or the window, or es 

 om the sugar box or molasses cask, as easily as from the petals of a flower, are 

 ly made prisoners, and perish by thousands. " God made the country and man 



