86 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Feb 1 



the imprinting qualities of the drone that she 

 originally mated with. 



This is not an uncommon illustration of the 

 atavitic (or alternate) generation influence 

 that is understood by a few of the most thor- 

 ough investigating breeders of all kinds of 

 stock. 



Now, then, to go one step further, if you 

 have that $200 queen in 1901, from her raise 

 more queens. In the most isolated place you 

 can find, place one, two, or three of her 

 daughters raised in 1900 ; from them raise 

 drones in abundance. With those drones let 

 the young queens mate raised in 1901 ; and 

 from the earliest raised and so mated raise 

 drones in another apiary, and mate queens 

 raised from themselves, and from the old queen 

 raise more queens to mate with the drones 

 from these daughters of the $200 queen. You 

 will say that is too much in-breeding ; but I 

 shall laugh at that bugbear of the in-breeding 

 whoop or howl. Then you raise drones from 

 this strong in-bred stock, and let queens from 

 worthless indigent stock mate with them, and 

 see the results in the next three or four genera- 

 tions. Advise J. P. Moore and others with 

 those $200 daughters to raise drones from 

 them just as early as they can, and note the 

 results from the young queen given a chance 

 to mate with them, and see if the drone in- 

 fluence doesn't tell more than 16 to 1. 



But look at this : That superior queen in an 

 apiary of 100 colonies, the hives of which her 

 daughters preside over, give an average of 5 

 lbs. more honey than the general run of bees. 

 The honey her daughters put in those 100 

 hives is 500 lbs., or an equivalent of $60, at 

 12 cts per lb. If an ordinary breeding queen 

 is worth $5.00. then that superior queen is 

 really worth $65.00. for the reason that she is 

 worth just as much as her influence produces 

 dollars and cents moie than another ; there- 

 fore, if your choice queen has furnished for 

 the numerous customers only 400 queens, her 

 actual worth is not less than $240. If from 

 her in 1901 you raise 1000 queens to dissemi- 

 nate, her actual value is to the bee-keepers not 

 less than 10 times the $60, or $600. Such 

 things are facts, and are positive ; so is the 

 natural law of 1 from 2, and 3 remains ; or 8 

 from 2 and 10 is the result. Subtraction does 

 multiply in the laws of nature, positively. 



Woodbury, Conn., Dec. 1. 



[I had always supposed that in-breeding was 

 in all cases undesirable. I know that nature, 

 in the case of many flowers, makes a studied 

 attempt to avoid it. Some flowers are sterile 

 to their own pollen. Others have the male 

 organs only, while other specimens of the 

 same species have the female organs only. In 

 still other plants, while they have both the es- 

 sential organs they are not both ripe at the 

 same time. Even in the animal kingdom we 

 find similar efforts to avoid in-breeding. If it 

 were not for nature's abhorrence of the mix- 

 ing of the same blood, drones and queens 

 would mate in the hive instead of in the air. 

 In the breeding of high-blooded stock there 

 may be an exception to this rule ; and if so, I 



should like to get more light, especially from 

 stock-raisers. 



Mr. Jeffrey's p int on why a queeu may be 

 worth $200 is well taken. If a rooster is worth 

 a hundred dollars, or even a thousand, why 

 should not an extra breeding queen be valua- 

 ble for a like reason ? — Ed ] 



THE BELGIAN-HARE BUSINESS. 



A Fair Statement ; Extravagant Statements ; Bees 

 and Rabbits Not a Good Combination. 



BY W. K. MORRISON. 



There have been so many conflicting ac- 

 counts of the Belgian-hare business that a 

 word from one who has a little knowledge 

 and practical experience in the pursuit may 

 prove acceptable just now. The word hare is 

 misleadiug to begin with. It is only an over- 

 grown variety of the common domestic rabbit, 

 such as we are all familiar with. In its native 

 country, Belgium, it is known as the Flemish 

 rabbit — an appropriate name. 



I mention this because Prof. Van Deman, in 

 a recent number of \^^ Rural New-Yorker^ 

 said that the Belgian hare is a hare, and would 

 not breed with the rabbit, and that the Aus- 

 tralian rabbit is a different animal entirely. 

 Surely Prof. Van Deman can have had no ex- 

 perience with rabbits; for if he will only al- 

 low his Belgian hares a good deal of freedom 

 and scanty fare, in a short time he will have 

 rabbits that can not be distinguished from the 

 rabbits of Australia. And, what is more, this 

 is how the Australian rabbits did originate, 

 simply by the running wild of the ordinary 

 domestic rabbit belonging to the early settlers. 



It may be well to state here that the rabbit 

 in Australia is not the pest that it is often rep- 

 resented to be by the newspaper press. On 

 the contrary, a great industry has arisen in 

 canned rabbit ; and now right here in Bermu- 

 da we can buy one whole Australian rabbit, 

 canned, for 24 cents ; and, besides, the skins 

 are in demand for felt. I saw by a recent 

 number of Cook's Poultry Journal that one 

 firm in Melbourne had sent last year to Eng- 

 land 5,000,000 rabbits, canned or frozen, and 

 that many of the farmers were making money 

 in the business of raising them, so they can 

 not be said to be a pest. I have no doubt that 

 the Australians will make money out of the 

 rabbit industry. Perhaps it is a better busi- 

 ness than digging gold out of placers. 



Some eight years ago I wrote an article on 

 the subject for the American Agriculturist, 

 in which I warned its readers against the amaz- 

 ing statements of interested parties who print- 

 ed all sorts of fairy tales to induce people to 

 buy their stock. If the warning was needed 

 then it seems to be much more necessary now. 

 In the long run these entrancing statements 

 will injure the rabbit business, when more 

 moderate statements might give rise to a good 

 business for a number of people. 



So far as my experience goes, rabbits require 

 a great deal of care — more so than poultry — 

 as each grown rabbit has to be attended to in- 

 dividually. They require pretty much the 



