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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



May 7, 1903. 



the same principle, and the fish and the tadpole get their air 

 from water in the same way. 



It is easy to illustrate osmosis by a very simple experi- 

 ment. If we take an egg and break off a little of the shell 

 without in the least rupturing the membrane just beneath 

 the shell, and then place this portion of the egg in water, 

 the water will at once begin to enter the egg through this 

 membrane, and the elements of the egg will soon begin to 

 pass out. That is, the cells pass these substances through 

 thfem in both directions. 



A better way to illustrate osmosis, or one that is more 

 graphic, is to take a piece of stomach or bladder, and tie it 

 over the large end of a funnel. We then fill the funnel with 

 a saturated solution of salt, and place it in water colored 

 with a little carmine or analine dye. At once the salt solu- 

 tion will pass through the membrane to the water, and the 

 colored water will begin to pass into the funnel. The 

 osmosis is much more rapid from water to salt than from 

 salt to water. Indeed it is found that the rapidity of osmo- 

 sis varies very much with different liquids, the kinds of 

 membrane used, with the extent of the membrane and with 

 temperature, heat and pressure. 



In the body, then, we have everything favorable for 

 very rapid osmosis. The membranes were developed for 

 the absorption of the liquids which bathe them, and so are 

 fitted for rapid work. The extent of membrane is very 

 great. The temperature of the body is most favorable, and 

 the pressure throughout the body stimulates the process. It 

 is found in the experiments with the funnel that as the 

 liquids become more uniform osmosis is less rapid. In the 

 body the liquids are so rapidily carried away by circulation 

 that uniformity is never approximated, and so the omosis is 

 always great. The tapeworm, and many animals of like 

 nature that are in the stomach or intestines of other animals, 

 and so constantly bathed with osmotic material, are often 

 without any stomach or alimentary canal at all. They do 

 not have to digest their food and so need no digestive organ. 

 All such simply absorb their nutriment from the rich 

 digested material in which they lie. Many of our worst 

 parasitic enemies like the porkworm or Trachina spiralis 

 take all their food by osmosis. The latter lives in countless 

 numbers in the muscles of man, hog, rat or mouse, and 

 through osmosis absorbs the liquid portion of the muscle 

 and thus snatches from their victims vitality, and very likely 

 life. Nearly all parasites in the softer tissues take their 

 food in this way. 



We are not surprised, then, that the larvse of bees, 

 wasps and ants, often take their food in the same way. 

 Their food is wholly digested for them by the nurses, and 

 thus has only to be absorbed, and this will take place 

 through the skin as readily as though any other membrane. 

 As the larval bees do not need to digest their food, it having 

 been done for them by the nurse-bees, they have no need to 

 take it into their alimentary canal, but can the better re- 

 ceive it into their blood directly through the skin. As sug- 

 gested, then, by your correspondent, these larval bees need 

 no umbilical cord, or, for that matter, any alimentary canal, 

 for they have enough in their skin to take all the needed 

 nourishment for their devolopment. 



The law of atavism refers to the inheritance of charac- 

 teristics not from the immediate parents but from more dis- 

 tant ancestors, perhaps very distant. Thus if a child re- 

 sembles its great, great, great, great, great grandparent 

 more than any other immediate ancestors, we say such a child 

 illustrates atavism. 



No doubt Cheshire was right in the quotation, referred 

 to by your correspondent. We know that bees were late in 

 developing. It was long after vegetables were created be- 

 fore we had flowering plants. Insects appeared as early 

 as the carboniferous period, and even earlier. But there 

 were no flowers until the cretaceous period of the later 

 mesozoic times. There could have been then no nectar- 

 loving insects until after the cretaceous period, and so our 

 bees, wasps and nectar-sipping flies, were of necessity of 

 late development. They are not only of late development 

 but of a higher development than most insects. We know 

 that the larva- of bees are practically footless, and func- 

 tionally entirely so. Any foot-like appendages, then, would 

 simply be vestigeal remains of true feet which were not 

 only present but functionally useful in their distant rela- 

 tives. 



I should then have no hesitation in giving atavism as 

 the law through which such vestigeal organs are to be ac- 

 counted for. All animals show such evidence. A very re- 

 markable one is in the gill slits of the pharnyx of our own 



very early embryonic development. These gill slits are 

 what are functionally useful in fish, but in us are very tem- 

 porary organs, illustrative of what were useful organs in a 

 very distant ancestor. There are a great many evidences 

 in our own physical make-up that illustrates this same 

 principle. I think it was Agassiz who once formulated the 

 law that all higher animals pass through stages in their 

 development which are permanent in lower forms. This is 

 only another way of stating that extreme atavism is often 

 illustrated in all groups of organisms, both plant and animal, 

 Los Angeles Co., Calif. 



An Experiment with Forced Swarming. 



BY CHAS. W. CILLEY. 



I SAW in the last Journal some questions in regard to 

 forced swarms, and as I have had some experience in 

 that kind of management of bees, perhaps I can write 

 something that will help some one'. 



Now, I have used this plan of forced swarms for the 

 past 4 years in my own apiary, and have not had a natural 

 swarm during that time. I have also done lots of that kind 

 of work for other people the past year, and it has been very 

 satisfactory to all of them, so I think it is pretty good proof 

 that the plan of forced swarming is all right. 



I also tested the plan by putting a forced swarm by the 

 side of a natural swarm that came out the same day the 

 forced swarm was made, to see if there would be a difference 

 in them in the fall, but I don't believe the best bee-keeper 

 in the world could have told the natural from the forced 

 swarm Oct. 1. It is a great saving of time and trouble 

 where one has to be away from home a good deal, or has an 

 out-apiary to look after. There are a number of ways to 

 make forced swarms, but I will give the way that suits me 

 best, and anyone can use it with safety : 



I usually make the forced swarms about the last week 

 in May, or the first week in June, but you cannot always go 

 by the time of the year to divide them, but when they are 

 strong enough in bees, or when they are about to swarm 

 naturally, take a hive that has starters an inch or more wide 

 in all the frames, with no supers on, and place it near the 

 hive from which you want the forced swarm to be taken, 

 then remove the old hive and set it back a few feet out of 

 the way, and place the new hive on the old stand. It should 

 be done in middle of the day, when the old bees are working 

 in the field, then they will return to the new hive on the old 

 stand, and you will not have to shake or brush them from 

 the combs. 



Then go to the old hive and blow in a few puffs of 

 smoke at the bottom, raise the cover after a few minutes 

 and blow a little smoke under, to drive the bees out of the 

 way ; then lift out the frames carefully, until you find the 

 frame the queen is on, carry this frame, bees and all, to the 

 new hive, lift the cover, and put the frame in the center of 

 the hive ; put on the cover, and you have the forced swarm 

 with most of the old bees and the old queen, the same as a 

 natural swarm, and also one frame of comb and brood, and 

 most likely some empty cells for the queen, so she can keep 

 right on laying. 



Now quite a lot of old bees are still in the old hive, and 

 will return to the new hive on the old stand, the first time 

 they fly, or most of them will, so you will see the forced 

 swarm will be about the same as a natural one. 



Now you can place the hive anywhere you please, and 

 the colony will probably not swarm that year, because so 

 few of the old bees will be left that they will not get strong 

 enough until the swarming season is over. 



The advantage of this plan of forced swarms is in hav- 

 ing only two good swarms, whera you would get two or 

 three, or perhaps more, if you let them swarm naturally. 



Now I think I hear some one say: "What will the colony 

 in the old hive do, as they have no queen ?"' If you do not 

 divide them until they have some cells started they will 

 soon have a queen from one of them ; but if you divide 

 them before they have cells started (queen-cells, I mean) 

 then they will rear a queen from some of the small brood, 

 or perhaps from eggs. 



Now some will say : "I don't like queens reared that 

 way." But I have seen as good queens reared that way as 

 any I ever had. I have one now that will be four years old 

 next spring, if she lives, and did fine work the past season. 

 But queens can be reared so as to have them ready when 

 you wish to make your forced swarms, and you can intro- 

 duce one of them in the old hive, if that suits better. 



I have never had a forced swarm leave or desert their 

 hive. Merrimack Co., N. H. 



