1S82 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



4S9 



were going to be called a failure, after all ; 

 do you think so, friend C.V The bees have 

 not yet found the honey of your spider 

 plant, as I have several times explained ; 

 and from your report one would think hon- 

 ey so plentiful in your locality that it is no 

 great wonder either. 



FRIEND POND'S REPIilES, ETC. 



QUEENS GOING VISITING ; MOKE ABOUT IT. 



EN foot-note to my article in Sept. Gleanings, 

 you ask if I am certain that the " going -a-visit- 

 ing queen" I wrote about was fertile; if there 

 was brood and eggs in the cells, etc. In reply I will 

 say, that I know she was fertile. She was a tested 

 queen, purchased from you, about a year old, and 

 very proliflc. I found eggs in the cells each time I 

 looked, and the queen continued laying, and has 

 kept on till the present time. Of course, I should 

 know if she had been superseded, for I make a prac- 

 tice ol carefully looking over each colony at east 

 once a week, consequently I know the condition of 

 every hive at all times. 



DO BEES CHANGE THE EGGS FROM ONE CELL TO 

 ANOTHER? 



I was somewhat skeptical in the matter, but am so 

 no longer, for I have satisfied myself that they some- 

 times do. About 20 days ago I found one of my col- 

 onies queenless, and at the same time found they 

 had filled every comb, in which there was no brood 

 or eggs, with honey. 1 had an extra frame or two 

 of empty comb, and gave this colony one in ex- 

 change for a frame full of honey. In the course of 

 four or five days I again examined this colony, and 

 found they had begun several queen-cells on this 

 empty sheet of comb. As it contained no eggs when 

 I placed it in the hive, of course the bees placed 

 them there, probably deeming it a better place in 

 which to rear a new queen. As there were eight or 

 nine queen-cells, the bees must have changed that 

 number of eggs, and they started no queen-cells ex- 

 cept on this sheet of comb. There can be no mis- 

 take about this, for I took the empty frame from my 

 honey-room where it had lain some six or seven 

 weeks; and as a queen hatched out from one of 

 these cells, the eggs could not have been laid by a 

 laying worker. I don't use the term " fertile work- 

 er," because it is impossible for a worker to be fer- 

 tilized, and I therefore deem the proper term to be 

 " laying worker." 



I am at a loss to know what is the trouble with my 

 queens this season. Four of them have died, none 

 of which were over a year old, and all " died in the 

 harness;" that is, thej' left plenty of worker brood 

 and eggs behind them, and showed no evidence of 

 failing powers by laying dnjne eggs. This experi- 

 ence is new to me; and as I have never read nor 

 heard of any thing of the kind, I am at a loss to 

 know or even guess (as I am a Yankee I have a right 

 to guess) what is the trouble. Has any one else had 

 the same trouble in his apiary? 



In the same foot-note you say, "Are you sure, 

 friend Pond, that Doolittle would not have secured 

 a fair crop?" etc. This question was asked in regard 

 to my complaint of a poor season. In reply I will 

 say, that I am well aware that friend Doolittle can 

 do most any thing but winter his bees successfully, 

 and that he is held up as a glorious example to all, 

 of success in obtaining big yields of honey; but I am 



certain that even he can't get a crop unless the 

 flowers yield; and in my case the production of 

 brood has been kept up the strongest I ever knew, 

 and that without stimulative feeding, and my bees 

 have all gathered enough to winter on ; they kept on 

 rearing drones, and would kill them off as fast 

 as they were hatched out. I tried to get them 

 to deposit in side boxes in the brood-chamber, but 

 they would not do even that; and while I might 

 have got a few pc)unds by extracting, I should have 

 been obliged to feed to make up for it. I don't 

 know how it is in your section, but here I never 

 knew a yield of surplus in a very dry season ac- 

 companied by very cold nights. The sources from 

 which honey is obtained in my vicinity are, first, 

 fruit-bloom, then clover, and the small fruits; as 

 there is no basswood or linden near me, no honey of 

 any consequence is obtained aftcir clover gives out, 

 until fall, and then quite a little harvest is yielded 

 by goldenrod, and other fall blossoms. At the pres- 

 ent time, honey is coming in very lively; the fields 

 and road-sides for miles around are yellow with 

 goldenrod; in fact, I never saw it bloom so exten- 

 sively as at the present time. J. E. Pond, Jr. 

 Foxboro, Norfolk Co., Mase., Sept. 14, 1883. 



DO BEES, WHEN IN HEALTH, VOID A 

 SOLID EXCREMENT ? 



Also some Facts on a iiiueli more Iiiipoi 

 tant Matter. 



BEES THAT WON'T WORlf. 



fpNCLOSED find a small quantity of the dry excre- 

 Ji| ta of the honey-bee, which I obtained in the 

 — ' following manner: Most of the time during the 

 summer, a colony of Italians of mine have been in 

 the habit of "hanging out" in the portico of the 

 hive, and, at times, spreadmg out on the alighting- 

 board, and on another board resting against its edge, 

 some 18 inches from the entrance of the hive. With 

 all the art my ingenuity could devise, backed by the 

 information as to "howothersdo it," crowding, sup- 

 plying sections filled with comb above and by the 

 side of the brood-nest, I could not induce them to 

 swarm or store in the surplus arrangements. After 

 concluding I should obtain no honey in boxes, I be- 

 gan supplying empty combs until I had increased 

 those in the brood-nest to 19, and they haven't scored 

 honey enough in them to keep them in stores the 

 coming winter. In short, they have done nothing 

 but breed, and to such an extent that, when the 

 drought began to pinch, tbcir hive contained about 

 a bushel of golden Italians — a good strain to raise 

 bees to sell by the pound ! Many times during the 

 summer, while Aiewing them as they hung on the 

 front of the hive, or spread on the alighting-board, I 

 noticed excrement fi-om those above fall among 

 those below; and when few or no bees were spread 

 out, it would roll off. Some would remain and hard- 

 en, and in such condition is that inclosed in the 

 package. I scraped it from the alighting-board into 

 a clean box with a piece of now tin. A magnifying- 

 glass will disclose very small particles of the weath- 

 er-worn surface of the alighting-board adhering to 

 some of the pellets. In other respects they are what 

 I represent them to be. I could have procured a ta- 

 ble-spoon full during the summer had I not consid- 

 ered the evidence in support of the theory (if theory 

 it may be termed) furnished through Gleanings, 

 sufficiently conclusive. But as a further substantia^ 



