THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



203 



more work and care to each colony than 

 in the home-yard. 



The drone is the son of his mother. He 

 has a grandfather, but not a father— 

 direct. You can see that the drone- 

 mother should show all the qualifications 

 of the queen-mother, and more, for her 

 drones must be uniform in size. You all 

 know that some queens that are good 

 queen-mothers are poor drone-mothers; 

 now, when we find that they are all O 

 K as to size, look well as to their wings. 

 Here is where you will find the worst 

 defect. Some queens produce lots of 

 drones with imperfect wings; don't use 

 such a queen for a drone-mother. Some 

 queens breed not only bantam queens 

 and workers, but drones as well. What 

 I mean by "bantam" is a runt-like bee. 

 It is not caused by starved brood, but 

 these queens will breed this way all the 

 time. It is not caused by the size of the 

 cell; it is some defect in the queen. I 

 have no use for such queens. 



Now, as you see, 1 test all my queens 

 that are promising breeders, to be sure 

 that they are good breeders as well as 

 good honey gatherers. It will not do to 

 guess at this business. After you are 

 sure that you have a good queen-mother, 

 rear all your queens from her. ( We will 

 say in 1909.) Now, in 1910, use the 

 same queen-mother, mating her queens 

 to her daughter's drones. I suppose it 

 would be safer to trap all of your breed- 

 ing queen's drones. I never have done 

 this, but do not allow any drone comb in 

 her hive, to speak of, just a few cells, 

 sometimes cutting off their heads occa- 

 sionally. Now, cull out every poor queen, 

 replacing them each season as long as 

 you use the same queen-mother; always 

 giving the best drone-mothers a full comb 

 of drone comb anyway, and more will do 

 no harm. 



HOW TO MAKE A START. 



Now, be fair with your bees; get the 

 best queens that you can find, of some 

 one else, not one but three or a half a 

 dozen. Give them a fair trial with your 

 own, and, as long as you find your own 



strain giving you more honey per colony, 

 keep right on breeding from them, test- 

 ing your breeders, always on the lookout 

 for a colony that is doing a little better 

 than the rest. Some of these sports are 

 good, more are not desirable. If, at any 

 time, you find that some one has better 

 honey gatherers, get a good breeder, a 

 tested breeder. Now, mate her queens 

 to your best drones, you will get some 

 surprises, or I lose my guess. You will 

 find it is diamond cut diamond. The 

 strongest strain will win out, and it may 

 be the poor traits that are the most 

 active. 



HOW I WOULD START ANEW. 



Should I lose all my bees of this strain, 

 I would get, say, six untested queens of 

 each of the two best queen breeders that 

 claim that their bees are superior honey 

 gatherers. I think that you would get 

 one queen out of the six that would be a 

 good one to breed from for a queen- 

 mother. From the other six I would 

 select my stock for drone-mothers, using 

 the best queen daughters for drone 

 mothers. Cross these two strains. Now 

 look for your ideal queen; and, when you 

 find her, rear all your queens from her 

 for drone-mothers, requeening everything 

 in the yard, unless you have an extra 

 good queen that you wish to keep, but 

 restrict her drones in some way. Now 

 use the same queen-mother as long as 

 she lives, repeating the same thing for 

 years, for, do you not see that I got my 

 best results when I used this method of 

 inbreeding? As each queen mates to a 

 different drone do you not see that it is 

 hard to inbreed bees, and as you are 

 using the very best all the time for 

 breeders, selecting only the good and 

 culling all inferior queens, what is there 

 to hinder you from fixing every trait so 

 it will be hard to lose them? Old 58 

 was set out of the cellar March 26th, 

 1910, and on April 16th, the colony had 

 five frames of brood. 



I wish every one who reads this could 

 see those frames of brood from a queen 

 in her fourth year. This has been an 



