Fcljruary. 191 - 



(American B^c Journal 



malady. Tlie exact cause will sooiu-r 

 or later l)e found, but it is certainly 

 not in sugar syrup. " Bacillus depilis,'" 

 and the newly discovered "nnsenia 

 apis," are both charged with it, but a 

 number of dissenters object, apparently 

 with good reasons. The disease is not 

 new. It is mentioned by Delia Rocca, 

 Huber, and Bevan. The last-named 

 writer calls it"\ertigo." Hamet, who 

 places constipation and vertigo under 

 two different heads, reports the exis- 

 tence of both diseases as an epidemic 

 in France in the middle of the V.nb 

 Century. And as to foul brood, we all 

 know that Aristotle mentioned it :^3i» 

 years before Christ, and many cen- 

 turies before sugar was manufactured. 



I believe it is as unreasonable to ob- 

 ject to sugar as food for bees in sea- 

 sons of scarcity as it is foolish to rec- 

 ommend the extracting of all the honev 

 in the fall to replace it with sugar 

 syrup, whether the honey was good or 

 not, under the plea of economy or 

 profit, as was done bv some a few vears 

 ago. 



Hamilton, 111. 



No. 2.— Improving the Honey- 

 Bee 



EV .\RTHUR C. MILLER. 



The increased honey-yield which is 

 possible by even a reasonable amount 

 of effort in selecting and breeding bees 

 is little realized by the majority of us. 

 At every assembly of bee-keep'ers the 

 works of indiviciual colonies are re- 

 counted, but rarely does one hear of 

 any intelligent attempt to perpetuate 

 the good results. An interesting ex- 

 ception to such condition came to the 

 writer's attention a few years ago, and 

 has been watched by him ever since. 



A ^professional honey-producer had 

 often noticed the differences, and made 

 effort along the usual lines, but with 

 only indifferent results. .About Ulu.j he 

 learned of some of the more advanced 

 ideas on breeding, and began anew his 

 efforts to improve his stock. His first 

 step was a careful study of all his colo- 

 nies in an effort to lind one at least 

 |)Ossessing marked superiority to the 

 rest. He took special pains not to be 

 misled by any possible results of ma- 

 nipulation or environment, and he 

 finally picked 2 colonies as possessing 

 desirable characters considerably above 

 the average stock. 



From one of the colonies he reared 

 Mj (|ueens the first year, allowing them 

 to mate as they would. The second 

 year he reared from the original breeder 

 !I2 queens, making every effort to mate 

 them to drones from the queens of the 

 |)revious season's rearing. This was 

 done by forcing to excess the drone- 

 production of those queens and sup- 

 |)ressing the drones of other colonies. 



The second year the colonies headed 

 by the young (jueens of the selected 

 stock showed honey-proiluctiou much 

 above the average of the rest of the 

 yard. 'l"ho third ye.ir found him with 

 l-.'i colonies of the selected stock, and 

 H4 of other grades. The selected stock 

 yielded much more than the others. 



During the season of ]!M)!) one apiary 

 had 2."i() colonies of the select stock, 



and yielded an average of (u pounds of 

 comb honey per hive, while another 

 apiary — one that he bought, on equalK 

 good pasturage— with the same sort of 

 hives and treatment, yielded him but 

 22 pounds per colony, over half of it 

 extracted. The restdts seem to prove 

 beyond dispute that he found and per- 

 petuated a true and valuable mutation 

 or " sport." • 



One of these queens was sent to the 

 writer in U)(I8, too late to show what 

 the bees would do as honey-producers, 

 but early enough to permit the queen 

 to build up a full colony of her own 

 bees. During the following winter and 

 spring their hardiness was carefully 

 compared with that of a strain o'f 

 known character, and thev ranked ex- 

 ceedingly high. During i'.iu!) many of 

 the drones from this queen mated with 

 queens of the writer's stock, and in 

 every such instance the drones stamped 

 their character strongly,being decidedly 

 dominant over the queen stock. In 

 reciprocal crosses the same dominance 

 of the new strain was apparent. It was 

 very easy to determine what the cross- 

 ings were because the two strains were 

 very different in color, shape and sun- 

 dry reactions. 



It is the writer's belief that if bee- 

 keepers would pay less attention to 

 color and more to the habits of their 

 bees they would gain knowledge of 

 them which would be of great help in 

 tracing blood. And until control of 

 the mating of queen and drone is se- 

 cured we must ilepend upon such 

 scrutiny to identify and retain the re- 

 sults of our labors. 



If color is " fixed," as it was in the 

 two strains just cited, then it is a very 

 valuable ally; but color is perhaps the 

 most variable part of the bee. Few of 

 the commercial queen-breeders pay 

 any further attention to the drones 

 they are to use than to take pains to 

 suppress those from mothers whose 

 workers are not well marked, and as 

 drones from the average run of even 

 the better strains of the yellow races 

 are in coloring quite variable, it is 

 small wonder that color is not often to 

 be relied on. But there are (lueens 

 which produce drones as uniformly 

 marked as the most critical could wisli, 

 and by use of such drones color may 

 become a dependable factor. 



Observations lead to the belief that 

 queens usually mate near home, and 

 that it is the drones that wander far 

 a-field, but if a little pains is taken to 

 obtain a supply of a few thousand 

 drones from a selected queen, and sup- 

 press all others in the immediate vicin- 

 ity, it will be found to be rare that a 

 queen will mismate. As a result of 

 many years' work, it is the writer's 

 conviction that with reasonable pains 

 along the lines indicated in the fore- 

 going, it is possible to make much 

 progress in breeding bees, perliaps 

 almost as well as if mating was under 

 positive control. 



The persistent efforts of the bee- 

 keeper referred to herein, coupled 

 with his natural ability, has produced 

 results not only gratifying and prcplita- 

 ble to himself, but exceedingly valuable 

 to the rest of us .is an example of what 

 can be done. 



Providence. K. I. 



Combination Device for Swarm 

 Prevention and Comb-Honey 

 Production in Brood- 

 Chamber 



BY \VILI.L\.\1 1. I'OOLE. 



A new method for obtaining comb 

 honey in the brood-chamber and the 

 prevention of swarming was experi- 

 mented with by Mr. Frank Darrah, in 

 his apiary at Van Cortland Park, N. Y. 

 While visiting Mr. Darrah one day at 



I. -Part of Ae'iakv oe' Frank Darraii. 



his apiary last spring, my attention 

 was drawn to this experiment which I 

 became interested in, and through the 

 kindness of Mr. Darrah I am writing 

 this article in the ho]ie that some of 

 the American Bee Journal readers will 

 become interested in it and help carry 

 this new method further. 



The experiment was tried in a hive 

 20x20x!t.!i inches, in which was insert- 

 ed !l frames of brood ami a queen. 

 These II frames of brood were centered 

 in the hive, and on each side was 

 placed a queen-excluder used in the 

 same way as the division-board. This 

 queen-excluder was made of the ordi- 

 nary perforated zinc with a strip nailed 

 on the top so as to let it hang on the 

 rabbets on the two ends of the hive on 

 which the brood-frames hang. It ex- 

 tended down flush with the bottom of 

 the hive to prevent the (|ueen passing 

 under it. 



When the brood-frames were put in 

 the hive close to.gether. and the queen- 

 excluder placed on each side, it left 

 room on each side of the excluders to 



X'li'w 111' HrvK .Showiso .Sections in 

 BhoodCiiamher. 



place two conib-lioney section-holders. 

 One comb-honey section-holder was 

 placed on each side of the hive at the 

 liottoni with 1 sections in each, -I'^x- 

 l,'.;xl's inches, and another section- 

 holder was placed on the top of each 



