CHAPTER III 

 THE COLONY AND ITS ORGANIZATION 



IN the proper management of bees, all manipulations must 

 be based on their normal activities. Bees are creatures of 

 instinct and are limited in their ability to adapt themselves 

 to changes in their environment. While in certain activities 

 they show evidences of memory, learning, association and 

 adaptive responses, in general they may be considered as 

 responding to their environment in a " machine-like " man- 

 ner. Because of the nature of most of their activities, it 

 becomes necessary to know their normal behavior even more 

 than would be the case were they more adaptive. In giving 

 directions for handling bees, the systems of manipulations 

 and apparatus are usually emphasized, but in the present 

 book the normal activities will be made more prominent so 

 that the reader may better understand the reasons for the 

 usual rules and systems. Again, most of the American 

 literature applies especially to the white clover region and 

 the rules fail to apply elsewhere, so that there seems to be 

 additional justification for a discussion of the more funda- 

 mental factors in beekeeping. 



It frequently happens that a supposedly new plan or 

 system is published which is old, except that it is a new 

 adaptation of well-known principles to slightly changed 

 conditions. The success or failure of these plans when tried 

 by others is often attributed to peculiarities of the various 

 localities where they are tested. The word " locality" is 

 called upon to cover a multitude of defects in our knowledge 

 of bee activities. Bees respond to stimuli in but one way 

 and wherever a given stimulus is applied, the result is the 



34 



