Aug. 1, 1901. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



485 



adverse comment it is doubtful if it has paid well, and I 

 hardly believe they knovs-ingly used this valuation for the 

 purpose of gaining such notoriety. In the American Bee 

 Journal for June 20, Mr. Doolittle gave us some figures, but as 

 he failed to notice that the mother of the drone vfith which 

 a queen mates is entitled to probably the same share in the 

 results as the queen's mother, and also that the mother or 

 mothers of the drones with which the breeding queen's 

 daughters mate, are also entitled to some share, his figures 

 are of little value. Some years ago I tried to estimate the 

 profit and loss in the case of horses, by the returns and 

 expenses of their parents and produce, but I gave it up as 

 a bad job, and I think the same fate will follow such esti- 

 mates regarding bees. Possibly some one who is capable 

 of compiling insurance statistics could help us out. 



In regard to this matter, I believe the Roots are pri- 

 marily merely guilty of bad advertising, but by their influ- 

 ence I believe they are establishing a faulty precedent. 

 For instance, it is unlikely that the average bee-keeper 

 who will buy queens of them, would refuse $5, or at the 

 most SIO, for his best queen, at the same time he is proud 

 of his best queen, and he naturally doubts whether he can 

 purchase her equal. He does not know her monetary value, 

 but he does know her comparative real value, and if she 

 has proved extra-good it is highly improbably that anj- 

 one's " say so " will convince him that there exists a queen 

 which is really worth from twenty to forty times what he 

 would take for her, especially as there is no logical reason- 

 ing back of the advertiser's estimate. If an advertise- 

 ment fails to convince it will fail to sell the goods, and in 

 this case it will likely cause antagonism. All things con- 

 sidered, and realizing the high reputation and great experi- 

 ence of the advertisers, would not the mere straightfor- 

 ward statement that this queen has proven beyond a doubt 

 to be '• by far the best breeder that we have ever owned " — 

 would not this, or some similar expression, coming from 

 such a source, make a far stronger, higher and more accept- 

 able and pleasing appeal, and might it not sell more 

 goods ? 



It strikes me as quite an innovation for one to adver- 

 tise anything that he finds it necessary to warn any por- 

 tion of the public against purchasing, and the rhetorical 

 figure including the pig and the wheelbarrow, is likely to 

 cool the ardor of some enthusiastic amateur. Why the 

 beginner with but few colonies should not get compara- 

 tively as much satisfaction out of such queens as the other 

 bee-keepers, I can not see. Naturally, he will not have as 

 much chance for comparison as the large honey-producer, 

 which perhaps in three cases out of four may prove favor- 

 able to the queen ; but he will not ordinarily put so much 

 money in a queen without giving it careful previous con- 

 sideration, and having purchased a queen at the highest 

 price from a reliable firm, is it not likely that he stands 

 quite a little more chance for satisfaction than the big 

 man ? To put it plainly, that warning looks to me like a 

 real insult to beginners, many of whom will become our 

 best amateurs ; and who has more time for research than an 

 amateur? Consider the proportionate amount of advice 

 which has been made in photography due to the researches 

 of amateurs as against professionals (although there are 

 millions who are mere dabblers), and should not everything 

 be done to encourage and stimulate the enthusiasm of ama- 

 teurs in bee-culture? No, Mr. Root, you ought to balance 

 that by saying something real nice in favor of amateur 

 " enthusimussy," and if the beginner is " begigged " to 

 buj' one of your high-priced queens, please let him do so, 

 for, just think of it, if he did not have the chance he might 

 get to drinking and spend that money in whiskey! 



But in Mr. Doolittle's article, above mentioned, does it 

 not look as if he were hurling missiles from a very fragile 

 point of vantage ? To show the power of example, I will 

 merely meiation that I have recentlj- noted four different 

 advertisements in which the greatest inducement offered to 

 secure purchasers is the Root Co.'s opinion of the monetary 

 value of the queens' grandmother 1 I Another uses Doo- 

 little's estimate in the same way in regard to the mother of 

 the queens he sells, except that Mr. Doolittle was doubtful, 

 and said. "If there is a breeder worth i?inO, this one is:" 

 still another does likewise as to Mr. Doolittle's assumed 

 monetary value of the grandmother 1 1 And if my tastes 

 ran that way, and if I were selling queens, I would quote 

 what the same gentleman wrote me of a queen I bought of 

 him — "This queen is worth fifty dollars to any one as a 

 breeder." 



Now, so long as people will attempt to place monetary 

 values on queens, are they not just as much to blame as 

 those who merely quote them ? I far more highly prize the 



opinion of one man who sold me a queen, and said, " She 

 is the best breeder we ever sent out." I know the man to 

 be honest in his opinion, and therefore that he really 

 believes I have the best queen that he ever sent out up to 

 that time ; whereas, if he had valued her say at fifty dol- 

 lars, there would always be a doubt as to whether or not he 

 had sold another that he valued at one hundred. 



In view of the fact that it is really impossible to fix 

 with any degree of accuracy a monetary value on a queen- 

 bee, could not our veterans and leading lights who stand 

 for all that is upright and honorable in apiculture, afford to 

 set a good example and be sufficiently philanthropic to 

 forego the pleasure of using such alluring figures, and, by 

 failing to assume such values, in a measure to discourage 

 the use of them for advertising purposes? 



Oueens are being advertised up to S25. and the scale of 

 prices is based on an arbitrary standard the value of which 

 is unknown — as I understand it they are not even guaran- 

 teed to be " best breeders." Now, I believe that a " best 

 breeder " averages the value placed upon it up to S5 ; but it 

 seems to me that if Mr. Doolittle's contention that only 

 one queen in four is equal to her mother (and I see no good 

 reason to doubt such a statement!, and it is evident that 

 where a queen is inferior it shows a lack of progression, 

 and that the offspring are likely to keep on retrograding, it 

 would seem that there is a great tendency towards a lottery 

 in this scale of prices, and that satisfaction ought to be 

 guaranteed on all queens sold for higher prices than best- 

 breeder rates, so that by returning a queen the purchaser 

 could get his money back, for, if Mr. Doolittle's experience 

 is repeated, only one man in four will get thorough satis- 

 faction. 



As to the scale of prices, I have puzzled over it with- 

 out any satisfactory results at all. Will not some one 

 please tell me how you work it out ? This is all I can get 



A queen giving bees of .19 tongue length is worth. . .SIO 

 " " " " .20 tongue length is worth 



(a $5 increase) IS 



A queen giving bees of .21 tongue length is worth 



(an increase double the last or SIO) 25 



Therefore, a queen giving bees of .22 must be worth 



(increase double last, or S20) ' 45 



and it follows that a queen giving bees of .23 tongue 



length is worth 85 



That is to say, that theS200 queen is only worth S85, 

 and her bees would have to have a tongue length 

 between .2+ and .25 to be worth $200. 



Or, let us assume that she is really worth S200, and 

 using the same scale of increase as we have above (between 

 .22 and .23 it was $40), we get the following values : 



.23 is worth S200 ; .22. S160 ; .21, $140 ; .20, $130 ; .19, $125, 

 From which naturally follows the query. How can 

 they afford to let them go at the advertised prices ? 



Allegheny Co., N. Y. 



[Since the above was written, Editor Root has an- 

 nounced that his firm will hereafter place no values on 

 breeders which they propose to keep and will not sell ; 

 therefore a portion of the above becomes inapplicable, but 

 as "there are others " it is deemed best to publish the' 

 article in full as written, — Editor.] 



Brood in Sections How to Avoid it. 



BY G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



WHAT is the cau<e of bees tilling- the sections with brood, and 

 drone-brood at that? What is the remedy for it ? I put on one 

 mrplus arrangement of sections some time affo. Ihinkinjr that 

 the bees were crowded for room, and perhaps would be forced to 

 swarm when there was no bloom to sustain the swarm, and to-daj I find 

 the above results. Would you destroy the drone-comb, or shave off the 

 heads of the drones in the cells? Please tell us throujrh thecolumsof 

 the American Bee Journal, as I think others would be benefited as well 

 as myself. 



AxswER. — The querist seems the more surprised that 

 the brood found in the sections was drone-brood, while if I 

 should find any but drone-brood in the sections I should be 

 surprised perhaps more than he, for I have yet to find 

 worker-brood in sections, unless the colony was a new 

 swarm and commenced their brood-nest " upstairs " when 

 they began to build comb, as is sometimes the case where 

 sections filled with foundation are placed on the hive when 

 the swarm is first run in, with nothing but starters or 

 empty frames below. Where swarms are hived on empty 

 frames, the sections should not be put on till the bees get 



