232 



July, 1916. 



American 'Ree Joarnal J 



begins sometimes as early as the last 

 days of May, it is absolutely necessary 

 that we have an exceedingly rapid and 

 strong development of the colonies 

 from the beginning of April until the 

 middle of May, or our bees come too 

 late, when the table is already cleared. 



It is a strange fact, which I often 

 have observed, that some one begins 

 beekeeping with zeal and love, aug- 

 ments his colonies until his bee-house 

 is full. (You know our hives are, as a 

 rule, close together in a little cottage.) 

 For 6, 8 to 10 years he gets nice honey 

 crops, and then his yard begins to fail. 

 He gets no swarms and has difficulties; 

 the crops become more and more 

 meager. The bee-man loses his interest 

 in bees and his colonies languish, or a 

 bee-disease makes short work with 

 them. This phenomenon finds its sim- 

 ple explanation in the growing old of 

 the brood-combs. In the beginning 

 the hives had beautiful new combs, 

 thrived, and even gave swarms. Later 

 on, when the house was full, the bee- 

 keeper did not think it necessary to 

 give foundation to his colonies, and 

 the poor bees were obliged to spend 

 their lives on the old, thick, black 

 combs. It is no wonder that they no 

 longer swarm, owing to the bad devel- 

 opment in spring. 



With our poor seasons we are obliged 

 to do in every line our best, and there- 

 fore a regular renewal of our brood- 

 combs is a conditio sine qua ?io>i .' I 

 for my part give every year to each 

 colony two sheets of foundation ; in 

 winter my bees occupy 10 combs, 10>^- 

 xl4 inches; in summer II to 13 combs. 

 In spring or summer I hang the old or 

 bad combs behind, for removal in the 

 fall. Thus I remove a number of old or 

 damaged combs, or combs with drone- 

 cells in places where we do not like 

 them. These combs are very useful, if 

 one is running for extracted honey. The 

 drone cells are cut out and a corres- 

 ponding piece of good comb is set in. 

 For extracted honey, old brown combs 

 are very good, because those combs do 

 not break in the extractor as new ones 

 do. However, the bees deposit the 

 honey always at first in the brown 

 combs and not in those quite black. 



Now a word about drone comb. The 

 experienced beekeeper knows that 

 each colony ought to breed a certain 

 number of drones. A colony without 

 any or with only a little drone comb 

 does not work with the same zeal and 

 delight as another, which is allowed to 

 breed drones enough. We must not 

 forget that the worker-bees are female, 

 and that in their little heart there must 

 be some sentiment of love towards the 

 other sex. If they have on account of 

 entire foundation no possibility to 

 construct drone-cells, they will satisfy 

 their desire by transferring worker- 

 comb into drone-comb in places where 

 we may not like to have the latter. I 

 let them build drone-comb on the bot- 

 tom of a center frame, a piece about 

 4x6 inches, or in 4 or 5 frames I give 

 them triangular spaces in the lower 

 corners of the frame. I avoid having 

 drone-combs in adjoining frames, be- 

 cause the space of l^s inches is too 

 little for drone-cells. The drone-combs 

 grow old very rapidly and contrarily to 

 worker-comb, the diameter of the cell 

 is considerably diminished in old 

 drone - comb, producing remarkably 



small drones. Therefore, I cut away 

 every year in spring the old drone 

 corners or drone rectangles. In April 

 and May it is a pleasure for the bees to 

 fill those empty spaces with drone- 

 comb, and I get stately and vigorous 

 bee-lads. Of course, I avoid giving 

 drone-comb to bad colonies, while 

 colonies with remarkable .qualities will 

 be given a great many drone-cells, 

 especially colonies selected for a mat- 

 ing stalion. 

 Zug, Switzerland. 



The Senses of the Honeybee 



BY N. E. MC INDOO PH D., 

 [Continued from June.] 



VON BUTTEL-RE;EPEN thinks that 

 bees have a queen odor, a family 

 odor, a drone odor, an individual 

 odor for each worker, a particular 

 odor for the bees canying wax scales, 

 a hive odor, etc. He produces almost 

 no experimental evidence in support of 

 his views. The writer is a firm believer 

 in his views, but has not been able to 

 devise experiments to prove most of 

 them. 



It is certain that a queen gives oflf 

 an odor, and it seems reasonable that 

 the odors from any two queens would 



be slightly different. It is also quite 

 probable that all the offspring of the 

 same queen inherits a particular odor 

 from her. This odor, called the family 

 odor, perhaps plays little or no use in 

 the lives of bees, for it is certainly 

 masked by the other odors. Drones 

 seem to emit an odor peculiar to their 

 sex, but little can be said about it. It 

 seems certain that each worker emits 

 an individual odor which is different 

 from that of any other worker. It is 

 also probable that the comb builders, 

 nurse bees, and those secreting wax 

 emit odors slightly different from those 

 of the field bees. Such a statement is 

 easily made, but perhaps beyond our 

 means of proving it. 



Of all odors produced by bees, the 

 hive odor is probably the most impor- 

 tant. It seems to be the fundamental 

 factor or principle upon which the 

 social life of a colony of bees depends, 

 and perhaps upon which the social 

 habit was acquired. It is the same as 

 the nest odor among ants. Without it 

 a colony of bees could not exist, since 

 it is composed chiefly of the individual 

 odors from all the workers in that 

 hive, and is supplemented by the odors 

 from the queen, drones, combs, frames 

 and walls of the hive, etc. In brief, the 

 odors emitted from all the objects 

 within a hive make up the hive odor. 



SECTION ACROSS A RATHER OLD DRONE-COMB-MAGNIFIED 



