AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



593 



winter, and rarely one which gave no 

 surplus. My experience is, that, by 

 paying very close attention to the selec- 

 tion of queens, and by having an exact 

 knowledge of what I might anticipate in 

 the way of blossoms which ordinarily 

 yield honey, and by having the bees 

 there whether any great harvest came 

 or not. in the course of the year they 

 have always found a yield ; and when- 

 ever I fail to stimulate part of my colo- 

 nies, and the natural sources fail to 

 secrete enough at all times to keep 

 brood-rearing going on from spring un- 

 til fall, the difference in the condition of 

 the colonies, standing side by side, seems 

 to be in favor of those I have stimulated, 

 by 50 per cent., hence I believe that on 

 this account alone stimulative feeding 

 pays. 



Mr. Richardson— I would like to know 

 what we put in the honey-buckets: it is 

 honey, isn't it? I have been riding 

 around to see some of those queen- 

 breeders, and they have led me to be- 

 lieve that it was " color " that I wanted 

 to put into the honey-buckets. I would 

 write to this one and say, "I want a 

 queen ; what have you got?" And they 

 would reply, " I have got some beautiful 

 queens that are all yellow." They do 

 not say whether they get any honey or 

 not, but they say that the queens are all 

 yellow. They say if you are not satisfied 

 with that, you don't have to buy. I don't 

 care whether a bee is as black as my 

 hat. I have had queens from bee-deal- 

 ers that I would not give a cent for a 

 thousand of them. They were of no use 

 I have not got a black bee in my apiary, 

 and I never have had. I don't want to 

 be understood that I want black bees, 

 because I don't, but what I do want is a 

 bee that will get the honey when there 

 is any honey to get. You give me a 

 queen that will give me 180 or 190 

 pounds of honey every year, and I will 

 stand it if their sting is a yard long. 



Dr. Miller — So far as we have gotten, 

 it would seem to prevail either that 

 stimulative feeding is a good thing all of 

 the time, or that it is a good thing some 

 of the time. I would like to know some- 

 thing about this matter. I would like 

 to have those who don't approve of stim- 

 ulative feeding, tell iis the harm in it. 

 Tell us the bad time to stimulate, and 

 the harm in it. 



Pres. E. T. Abbott— I would like to 

 say something about those yellow bees. 

 The tendency to yellow is sporty. Every 

 one that has raised chickens, for in- 

 stance the Golden Wyandottes, where 

 the color is yellow and black, knows 

 there is a tendency to^ extreme yellow- 



ness or to extreme blackness. This 

 splashing of yellow denotes sporty chick- 

 ens. It simply indicates that it is a 

 mongrel. You mix Cyprian blood with 

 Italian blood, and you will get yellow 

 bees for four generations. If I may be 

 allowed to use the expression, we want 

 the "feathers" of the bee distinctly 

 marked, the same as in the chicken. It 

 is a mistaken idea that all yellow bees 

 are sports, and not good breeders, but 

 some of the queen-breeders have got the 

 idea that the bees should be yellow all 

 over, and that is all that is necessary. 



Dr. Miller — Let me ask you : Suppose 

 you have Italian bees which you know 

 are pure, and there are nothing but pure 

 Italian bees in your locality, I would 

 like to know if you go on breeding from 

 these alone what will be the tendency in 

 regard to the color. Will they stay the 

 same? 



Mr. Abbott — The tendency of imported 

 bees is to become lighter all the time. 

 Every generation will make them a little 

 lighter, but the markings will be the 

 same. The color would be lighter, but 

 there would be no change in the mark- 

 ings. 



Dr. Miller — I would like to have an 

 answer to my other question. Some say 

 that stimulative feeding is a good thing, 

 and others say that it is not. I would 

 like to know how that is". 



Mr. Holtermann — I can answer that, I 

 think. It is objectionable at all times, 

 possibly with a few exceptions. There 

 are some bees after the basswood flow 

 that do not get anything, and as the 

 bees are getting old, it is a good thing 

 to stimulate them to get them to care 

 for the brood. I don't think it is a good 

 thing to stimulate them early in the sea- 

 son, because they get too much brood in 

 the hives, and unless the hives are pro- 

 tected when cold weather comes along, 

 the brood will chill, and harm is done in 

 this case ; but one man cannot judge for 

 another, and in my locality the bees get 

 enough naturally to keep the queen lay- 

 ing as rapidly as the bees are able to 

 take care of the brood. Just before the 

 cold spell came on, the bees got a good 

 deal from the fruit-bloom, and they were 

 assisted very much, while others were 

 not. My hives were clogged with bees, 

 and if I were to stimulate them I would 

 clog the brood-chamber. 



Mr. Richardson — Now in regard to 

 that color question. I was talking to a 

 queen-breeder the other day, and I said 

 to him, *' I want you to answer a ques- 

 tion about these bees. You have been 

 breeding them, and I want to know just 

 what you think of them, and he says. 



