572 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Sept. 15 







D. S. VAN WARMELO'S APIARY IN SOUTH AFRICA. 



About IS months ago I imported Italian 

 queens from England, and am now experi- 

 menting with their genuine offspring in Pre- 

 toria — the first person who has succeeded in 

 rearing them pure in the Transvaal. One 

 or two of my observations with bees may be 

 interesting, the first of which, probably, none 

 but myself has ever witnessed. 



During the Anglo-Boer war, while I was 

 fighting the enemy my brave bees in Pretoria 

 stung an English officer's horse to death that 

 had cost him /40, or nearly §200. My mother 

 was immediately ordered by the' provost 

 marshal to remove the bees, which she did, 

 but to a place that did not suit me on my re- 

 turn after the war; so I made up my mind to 

 move them to a place about 150 yards dis- 

 tant. There were only six colonies. The 

 first thing I did was to put them close beside 

 each other. During a honey-flow, when I 

 knew the well laden bees of a strange hive 

 would be accepted with open wings, I remov- 

 ed one outer hive to the new place after sun- 

 set; waited two or three days, and again re- 

 moved an outer hive, continuing to do so un- 

 til there was only one hive left — a tremen- 

 dously strong colony, flowing over with the 

 foragmg bees of the other five hives that had 

 returned to the old spot. As the removal 

 had been gradual, the foraging bees had be- 

 come usecTto shift, and concentrated toward 

 the center. This last hive I removed after a 

 few days, after sunset, and put an empty 

 one in its place. Next evening there was a 

 great queenless cluster in this emptv hive, 

 which I took and shook out before tHe hive 

 I had removed last. The bees were accept- 

 ed without demur, most of them having ac- 

 quired the same scent. 



This proceeding I continued for a few 

 nights successiveh', when, lo! the bees sav- 



ed me the trouble of carrying the dwindling 

 cluster to its new place. 



One night after sunset, while I stood watch- 

 ing to see if any bees were still flying out 

 from the hives, prior to my fetching the clus- 

 ter in the empty hive, I heard a swarm of 

 bees over my head, which I saw entering the 

 last hive, the one in front of which, every 

 evening, I shook out the cluster. I immedi- 

 ately hurried to the hive that had contained 

 the cluster, which, according to my expecta- 

 tions, I actually found empty. The bees had 

 agreed between themselves to put an end to 

 this shook-swarmingof the master by swarm- 

 ing out of their own accord to the abode 

 where 1 had been trying to make them stay. 



Though it is evident that there had been 

 communication between the cluster and the 

 mother-hive, it would be too far-fetched to 

 suggest the other alternative — namely, that 

 the bees of the queen-right colony had sent 

 out scouts to bring the cluster home. 



This is an instance of Maeterlinck's "spirit 

 of the hive " that makes us wonder what 

 reasoning powers bees have. 



ANOTHER CASE OF THE ADAPTABILITY OF 

 BEES TO CIRCUMSTANCES. 



This case was brought to my notice in the 

 way of stimulating a colony containing fer- 

 tile workers in the following manner: 



An Italian queen that I had reared careful- 

 ly in a nucleus hive I could not find on the 

 combs about a day after it had hatched. On 

 reopening the hive on the following day I 

 found to my surprise the cell from which the 

 queen had hatched sealed over arain. I 

 opened it, having an inkling of what had 

 happened. My conclusions were verified. 

 It contained two dead worker bees and one 

 live one. There is, in my opinion, no doubt 

 that these three bees were closed up by the 



