1890 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



605 



positively; but reasoning- from general priacip'es, 

 I should say not. 

 Illinois. Mrs. L. Harrison. 



I doubt whether as good queens can be raised 

 either before or after as during the swarming sea- 

 son. Still, if the bees are fed bountifully, and the 

 weather is favorable, it is possible that good queens 

 can be raised any time. 



Illinois. N. C. C. Miller. 



I think not. Weather is too changeable, and I 

 doubt wholher we can supply to the bees, when 

 confined to the hive, food for queen-rearing that 

 will equal that which they are able to provide when 

 weather is warm, and they are flying freely. 2. 

 Yes, with good weather and plenty of honey com- 

 ing in. What is to hinder? 



Wisconsin. S. W. S. 1. Freeborn. 



Just as good and just as prolific queens as I ever 

 had in my yard have been raised at both extremes 

 of the season. Liberal feeding and favorable 

 weather are needed. This season, 1890, with us has 

 been so cold that queens could not be raised to ad- 

 vantage. Hot weather and a good flow of honey, 

 or feed, and care on the part of the apiaiist, is all 

 that is necessary to raise good queens. 



New York. E. Rambler. 



I am glad to see so many of the opinion 

 that just as good queens can be raised out- 

 side of the swarming season, and I am glad, 

 too, to see so many suggest that all the con- 

 ditions must be complied with. The finest 

 queens I ever reared in my life, and the 

 most satisfactory work in building up col- 

 onies I ever did, was during August and 

 September, when we were compelled to 

 keep things moving by daily feeding. Of 

 course, bees got pollen plentifully from corn 

 and other sources ; but they obtained so 

 little honey that brood-rearing would have 

 stopped almost entirely had it not been for 

 the daily rations of sugar syrup. Nature is 

 good ; but the keen, energetic, and enthusi- 

 astic student of nature can make nature 

 boom in a way she rarely if ever does boom 

 without man's assistance. 



0aR 0WN ;^pi^^Y. 



CONDUCTED BY KRNKST B. HOOT. 



STINGLESS BEES AT THE HOME OF THE 

 HOXEY'-BEES. 



Two or three weeks ago we were notified 

 that a box of bees was at the express office. 

 As they had come from Cuba, we suppos- 

 ed, of course, they were all dead, and were 

 questioning whether we should accept them. 

 We pried off the cover, and on peering 

 through the perforated tin we saw, not a lot 

 of dead bees, but a few dozen little insects 

 that looked very much like what we call 

 " sweat bees.'' Surmising that they might 

 be the stingless bees, we accepted them at 

 once. Mr. Spaflord and I did not know 

 what to do with the things I was a little 

 afraid that they might not be able to defend 

 themselves against the ordinary Italians; 

 and although they were stingless, I had 

 read somewhere that they could bite fear- 

 fully hard. Mr. Spafford was requested to 



fix them up and make the entrance so nar- 

 row that the ordinary bees could not pass 

 through. In the mean time the following 

 letter came to hand, which explains itself : 



Mr. Rudt:— With this I send the stingless bees 

 that I wrote you about. I hope they will reach you 

 in good condition, as they are queer little fellows. 

 Some time ago we had ten days of very rainy weath- 

 er, and the top of the box that they are in had a 

 large crack, and let the water into the box. When 

 the weather was good I went out to see my bees, 

 and I noticed that these little fellows were bringing^ 

 water up to the door, each one two drops at a time; 

 and as last as one would back into the hole there 

 would be another. 1 took off the top, and, to my 

 surprise, found it about half full of water. They 

 were pumping it out as fast as they could. There 

 is not any thing known about these bees. No one 

 has ever seen them swarm. These have been in 

 this box ten years. You will see that at first it was 

 a one story ; but as they filled that up to give them 

 more room, the other piece was put on. I hope you 

 will be able to enlighten us about them. 



Havana, Cuba, July 16. James Warner. 



Yes, indeed, they are "queer little fel- 

 lows." We caught a few and found that 

 they could not be made to sting, and for the 

 very good reason that they could not use a 

 weapon that they did not have. The facts 

 related by friend Warner are interesting. 

 Just think of those little fellows carrying 

 the water out, one by one, in little bits of 

 loads from the bottom of their box ! When 

 the box arrived I noticed that it was a little 

 damp inside, and this was doubtless because 

 of it. No, friend Warner, there is not very 

 much known about these bees. In some of 

 our back numbers, two or three subscribers 

 have mentioned seeing them in Mexico and 

 elsewhere. I have been vainly looking over 

 the indexes in our back volumes, but I fail 

 just at the moment to find any thing regard- 

 ing them. I have, however, been watching 

 them very closely. 



I will say to our readers, that these bees 

 are about two-thirds the size of the ordina- 

 ry Italian bee ; and as I said at the outset, 

 they look very much like our sweat bees of 

 the North. On the whole they are rather 

 pretty and sprightly, and exceedingly quick 

 on the wing. What they lack in a sting is 

 made up in powerful mandibles, or jaws ; 

 and 1 amused myself considerably by poking 

 long timothy straws into their entrances, to 

 see the little fellows get hold of the grass 

 and fairly bite it in two; and when their 

 jaws went together I could hear them snap. 

 I wanted to put my finger into the hole and 

 feel them bite, but I could hardly scrape up 

 courage enough. Finally when a triend 

 came around 1 called him up to the hive and 

 told him we had some stingless bees, and 

 suggested the propriety of putting his finger 

 in at the entrance, to see what they would 

 do. Nothing daunted he did so, but they 

 seemed to think there was no use wasting 

 their strength on such a big object, and sim- 

 ])ly backed into their hole and allowed his 

 finger to remain unmolested. After assur- 

 ing myself that they would not hurt him, I 

 tried it. Very soon some of our Italians 

 began to buzz around, because the box had 

 a strong odor of Southern honey. While 



