1880 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



321 



bee farm at Larnica, the principal port on the Island. 

 By the way, I might here mention that I took a Mr. 

 Frank Benton, a first class queen raiser and bee-keep- 

 er, from the Agricultural College, Michigan, to take 

 charge of the apiary there, and raise and ship queens 

 to me in Canada after I return home. I found great 

 difficulty in procuring the bees, as 



THE IGNORANCE AND SUPERSTITION 



of the natives is so great, that, in many instances, 

 both money and words failed to convince them that 

 their future welfare did not depend on their refus- 

 ing to sell their hives, and after leaving them they 

 sometimes fumigated their bees and bee yard with 

 the smoke of some sacred bones to drive away the 

 evil and witchcraft that I had been practicing on 

 them. I found some parties destitute of food, and 

 on one occasion I bought fifty colonies where the 

 parties bad been living on herbs of various kinds 

 for weeks, and as I advanced them a sovereign it 

 was immediately dispatched for food, and the moth- 

 er remarked that God had sent me there to relieve 

 their sufferings, and she hoped the good God would 

 watch after me. I will have from two to three hun- 

 dred colonies there at Larnica in a short time, but 

 I find it very expensive carrying colonies of bees 

 thirty, forty, and sometimes sixty miles over the 

 mountains on mule and camel backs, as the roads 

 there can only be traveled in that way, except the 

 one the English Government made to Nicosia. 



THE CYPRIAN BEES 



have proved themselves to be far superior to our 

 bees of America, and I have already received a large 

 number of orders from some of the best bee-keepers 

 of Europe. EVen the Italians of Italy are getting 

 them to improve the Italian bees of their country. 

 The Cyprian bees are a pure and distinct race, hav- 

 ing been confined to the Island for perhaps thou- 

 sands of years, and isolated from all other races. 

 They breed much earlier in spring and later in the 

 fall and winter, far better than any European bee or 

 our American and Canadian varieties. They fly 

 much farther to gather honey and fly swifter than 

 our bees, and protect their stores with such deter- 

 mination that moths and other enemies of the bees 

 cannot injure them. They build more worker comb 

 and less drone comb than our bees, and are less in- 

 clined to raise drones. They are more judicious 

 about flying out in spring in bad weather and seem 

 to give more attention to early breeding. They 

 have a reddish golden shield running across the 

 back between the wings, which is partially covered 

 by the long hair around it, and the underside of the 

 abdomen is a very light golden color, almost to the 

 tip, which is darker. I have no time to give you 

 further description of them now, as I wish to say a 

 little about 



THE BEES OP THE HOLY LAND, 



and our animals are about ready to start. I left Mr. 

 Benton to see after my Cyprus apiary and complete 

 my arrangements for starting back to America with 

 a large number of bees, and I am making a flying 

 trip through Palestine and Syria to examine the 

 bees of this country. I have not had experience 

 enough with them to give an opinion, but I have 

 been so favorably impressed with them that I have 

 decided to import a large number of the bees, which 

 are called here by the natives holy bees. That they 

 are a pure variety there is no question in my mind. 

 I believe they have been here from the foundation 

 of the world, in all probability without being mixed 



with any other race. They are similar in some re- 

 spects to the Cyprian bees, especially in being able 

 to fly a long distance from their hives. I found them 

 in some sections where the pasture was poor near 

 their homes and good far away, gathering honey an 

 incredible distance from their hives, in one instance 

 more than double the distance our bees fly. I have 

 secured a number from different localities and in- 

 tend to secure some from all the different points 

 where I am favorably impressed with them, or rath- 

 er from points varying from fifty to one hundred 

 miles apart, so if there is any difference I can have 

 the best. I secured some at Jerusalem and other 

 places in Judea, some from Mount Lebanon, some 

 from Damascus, some west of the Jordan and Dead 

 Sea and other places. I send them all across the 

 country on mules and camels to the Mediterranean, 

 and by steamer to Cyprus, where they are prepared 

 for their long journey to Canada. I find great diffi- 

 culty in getting them safely to the sea, as the dis- 

 tance is so great and the earthen pots or tubes and 

 clay cylinders are so easily broken, and the natives 

 so unreliable, and mules so unsteady. One mule 

 with bees walked too close to a rock at the side of 

 the trail and struck the hive against it so hard it 

 smashed, and the bees began to swarm around the 

 mule, and he 



MADE A BEE LINE FOR THE JORDAN 



and Dead Sea, and the only thing I know yet is that 

 he was going when last heard from, but minus his 

 load. So I entrusted three more to another party 

 and hope they will go safely. But the expense of 

 getting them from such long distances from sea or 

 railways or even wagon roads is so great, and so far 

 exceeded my expectations that I was forced to send 

 a cable message home from Jerusalem for a large 

 sum of money to enable me to carry out the project. 

 As the animals are now waiting I must start, so 

 I close by saying I will report progress in future. I 

 send this by a muleteer to be posted in Jerusalem, 

 or to be forwarded on to Jaffa if he finds a trusty 

 party. D. A. Jones. 



We clip the following from the Indiana Farmer: 



Supply the vowels in the following sentence, and heed the ad- 

 rice it contains: KpyrstcksstrngfywehtBccdnbcltr. 



We can endorse the advice. 



We have received of G. W. Cole, Canton, Fulton 

 Co., 111., a garden plow, to be worked by hand, which 

 pleases us very much for working among many 

 kinds of plants on the honey farm. 



UNFERTILE QUF.ENS NOT A MARKETABLE COMMODITY. 



Every summer a great many of the new scholars 

 ask if dollar queens are fertilized; others, after 

 having purchased a queen, if she is not quite as 

 large as they expect, or if she does not lay imme- 

 diately, write back charging me with selling unfer- 

 tile queens; others ask what I will pay for unfertile 

 queens. I wonder if a little mild scolding will be 

 amiss. Now, once for all, please bear in mind that 

 an unfertile queen is of no sort of use to anybody, 

 as a thing to buy or sell, and one who does sell them 

 might just as well sell counterfeit money. I never, 

 in my life, knowingly sold one before she had com- 

 menced to lay, and never expect to. It is true, you 

 might take them out of the lamp nursery, and sell 

 them to some one who could introduce them within 

 an hour, but, if even one day old before being intro- 

 duced, it will be next to an impossibility. 



