1889 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



345 



keeping it a year or more, and by furnishing 

 a signer. As we do not get it at that rate 

 at present otherwise, I prefer to pay the 8 

 per cent, especially because, by so doing, I 

 can better fulfill the command of the little 

 text I started out with—" Owe no man any 

 thing, but to love one another." 



THE SIZE OF BROOD-CHAMBER. 



DADANT STRONGLY IN FAVOR OF LARGE-SIZED 

 FRAMES. 



GREAT RHINOCEROS BEETLE. 



NOT AN ENEMY, AFTER ALL,. 



T HAVE the following- letter from E. Wetherold, 

 jfflf Bryantowu, Md.: 



W Respected Friend: — I send you a beetle which 

 "iL is a curiosity to me, as I have never seen one 

 like it before. I wish you would describe, illus- 

 trate, and give a sketch of its mode of life and 

 habits for the readers of Gleanings. I am sure it 

 would interest all. It was found in a decayed 

 locust-tree which has been gradually dying for 

 some years. Are these insects the cause of the 

 death and decay of the trees? Locusts in this State 

 are seriously injured by what are called borers. I 

 have never seen these borers, but supposed them to 

 be quite different from this beetle. 



GREAT RHINOCEROS BEETLE, NATURAL SIZE. 



This beetle (see cut) is one of our most formidable- 

 looking insects. It is known as the great rhinoceros 

 beetle (Dynastes titi/us, Linn.). Irs form, size, and 

 markings are well shown in the excellent figure 

 which I inclose. It is greenish in color, often with 

 a yellowish tinge, with black dots. The ends of the 

 horns and the legs are black. It is reported that 

 some of them are uniformly brown, like our May 

 beetles. The lower horn can be moved so that, as 

 it comes against the upper, it might form quite a 

 formidable weapon of offense and defense. On each 

 side of the pro-thorax is a short horn, one of which 

 shows in the figure. Indeed, though perfectly 

 harmless it is about as startling in its appearance 

 as any Insect I know of. It is a Southern species, 

 and has been found from Maryland to Missouri, in 

 southern Indiana, and to the Gulf. The grubs feed 

 on decaying wood, and so this one does not destroy 

 the Maryland locusts. The beautiful locust-borer, 

 a trim, long-horned beetle, yellow and black in col- 

 or, is the real enemy, and it is a serious one all over 

 the United States. When the trees decay from the 

 attack of the locust-borers, then this rhinoceros 

 beetle finds in it a suitable nidus for its eggs. Thus 

 it is not strange that our friend Mr. Wetherold 

 found this one as he did. The female looks like the 

 male, but has only a tubercle in place of the long 

 horn. I should be very grateful if some Southern 

 friend would send me a female. I am very glad to 

 receive all such insects, and will gladly describe 

 them when sent to me. A. J. Cook. 



Agricultural College, Mich. 



TN the answers on the number of brood-frames in 

 d|P the hives, page 224, we give the larger number, 

 W while Messrs. Doolittle, Hasty, and, I could add, 

 ■*■ Gravenhorst, as per his article, page 210, use the 

 smallest-sized hives. Let me tell how I came to 

 the conclusion that large frames and capacious 

 hives give better results than small ones. When 1 

 arrived in this country, 26 years ago, I had never 

 seen shallow hives; so my first hives were made of 

 the same size as the Debeauvoys, 12J4 x 14, which 

 was about the same as the American, 9 frames to 

 the hive. A little later I tried the Quinby hanging 

 frame; then enlarged both kinds, to place at the 

 sides glassed surplus boxes, as per the idea of Mr. 

 Jasper Hazen. But seeing that bees were reluc- 

 tant to work In the side boxes I replaced them with 

 frames. My American was thus enlarged to 14 

 frames, and my Quinby to 13. But as my best 

 queens had too much room in these Quinby frames, 

 I reduced them to nine or ten, with one or two par- 

 tition-boards besides. Yet as I had begun to raise 

 bees for sale, and as most of my customers wanted 

 them in Langstroth ten-frame 1 lives, I had to com- 

 ply with their preferences, and introduced this size 

 In my apiaries, being thus enabled to experiment 

 on three different kinds of hives. I had begun, al- 

 so, to raise Italian queens for sale, using at first 

 small nuclei with combs 5x5 inches. But as I had 

 to cut my combs to give brood or honey to these 

 nuclei, I got the idea of dividing a few of my large 

 Quinby frames in two equal parts, which could be 

 taken apart or reunited at once. A small engrav- 

 ing of this device appeared in Gleanings for 

 March, 1874, page 28. I made 25 such nuclei, every 

 one of 11 half Quinby frames capacity. I used 

 these nuclei with the best results as long as I raised 

 queens for sale. It was an easy matter to keep 

 them strong and well provisioned by borrowing 

 from those of my hives in which I had introduced 

 some of these divisible frames. 



In the latter part of summer, as fast as one of 

 these nuclei was deprived of its queen, its bees 

 were given to another, and so on till the eight or 

 ten left had a sufficient number of bees for a good 

 wintering. Yet, while these small hives wintered 

 perfectly, I have been unable to build them up in 

 spring to the strength of my large hives; for at the 

 beginning of June, while my Quinby had, on an 

 average, seven or eight combs full of brood, my 

 nuclei had hardly brood on eight or nine half- 

 combs. 



Having narrated these facts lately in the Revue 

 Internationale, of February, 1889, its editor, Mr. 

 Bertrand, added in note: 



"It is a similar observation, made about ten 

 years ago, which has definitively convinced us of 

 the superiority of the large frames. Supposing 

 that the keeper of one of our apiaries desired to 

 have bees of his own, we gave him a swarm and a 

 few hives, known under the name of Vaudoises, 

 and containing 13 frames 11 x 10 inches. This apia* 

 ry of our bee-keeper, placed on our own ground, 

 side by side with our own bees, increased in num- 

 ber with time, but these small Vaudoises have 

 never equaled, neither in population nor in prod- 

 uct, our large layer? " (14 to 16 frames, of the 

 American size). 



