THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



229 



the first of May. About the latter date we 

 transferred all our bees, the blacks from 

 the old box liives to hives witli niovable- 

 irames, the Italians from movable-frames to 

 frames of a different shape. A^aiii we 

 found a decided difference between the con- 

 dition of blacks and Italians. The blacks 

 averaged mncli stronger and had a much 

 larger amount of brood than the Italians. 

 But I will pass these things by, as of minor 

 importance, and go on to tiie main point for 

 which all bees are supposed to kept, viz.: 

 the largest possible amount of pure lioney 

 in the most salable shape. 



When summer came and tlie trees were 

 laden with bloom, the meadows carpeted 

 with rich white clover, and each tiower well 

 stored with nectar, then it was that I be- 

 came completely disgusted with Italian 

 bees. Our blacks were getting on in the 

 most satisfactory manner, building and 

 storing a whole section in a single day, 

 while I found it impossible to induce Ital- 

 ians to enter the boxes at all. Uut instead 

 they were filling the brood chamber below, 

 and, wherever there was any possible space, 

 building small additions of comb; mean- 

 while they were trying to swarm with the 

 wildest confusion, and swarm they did with 

 but a small amount' of bees, and without a 

 single queen cell. Then it was I stocked 

 our nuclei with queen cells from our pure 

 and most prolific blacks, and whenever I 

 had occasion to introduce queen cells I did 

 so from black stock. The result is that 

 nearly all our increase for last year is black 

 bees. 



My father, a close observer, a practical 

 and successful bee-keeper, with many ex- 

 periments, and with a keen eye to the in- 

 terests of his apiary, has had similar ex- 

 perience and has arrived at the same 

 conclusions. 



There are those to whom I think Italians 

 might be recommended. To beginners, 

 who ai'e unaccustomed to handling bees; to 

 persons of nervous temperament, to tiiose 

 who are by nature timid; and to gentlemen 

 and ladies who keep bees for pleasure 

 rather than profit, I would recommend pure 

 Italians, the purer the better, for I find the 

 lighter the color the more docile the bee. 

 But to all who mean business, and wish to 

 produce the largest possible amount of sal- 

 able honey, I would recommend black bees, 

 the queens to be bred from the most prolific 

 mothers, the breeder having always in mind 

 the great law of natural selection, and, fol- 

 lowing the example of our universal mother 

 —nature— permiting only " the survival of 

 the fittest." 



Finally I do not present these views to 

 raise needless controversy, but rather that 

 the truth may be more fully brought out. 

 The facts that I have set forth have im- 

 pressed themselves upon my mind, and 1 

 believe them to be worthy the attention of 

 all honey-producing bee-keepers. And to 

 the end that we may get at the truth of this 

 matter I am anxious to co-operate with all 

 apiculturists who are laboring for the high- 

 est triumph of apicultural science. 



W. L. POKTEK. 



[Following this was a very lively discus- • 

 sion. No one present fully concuri-ed with 

 the writer of the paper. 



The president said while Mr. Porter's 

 premises were correct, his conclusions 



might not be so. While black bees are the 

 best to go into boxes, that is not a conclu- 

 sive argument in their favor, for honey in 

 boxes is not always as desirable as honey in 

 small frames. Again, the Italian bees may 

 dwindle more rapidly in the spring, owing 

 to their more active habits— qualities really 

 in their favor. But the apiarist should pre- 

 vent early spring flights and thus remove 

 the difficulty. 



An exchange justly remarks: Mr. Dzier- 

 zon, the man who stands highest among the 

 great bee-masters of Europe, says, after 2.5 

 years' experience with Italian bees, that in 

 Germany their importation has greatly in- 

 creased the returns from the culture of bees 

 and that he finds them more beautiful, more 

 gentle, more watchful, more prolific, and 

 possessed of greater diligence than the com- 

 mon bees. Again, at a recent bee-keepers' 

 convention held at Breslau — one of those 

 great and enthusiastic meetings for which 

 the Germans are so celebrated— the conclu- 

 sion was reached that in poor seasons the 

 Italian bees show themselves superior to all 

 other races. Besides the common and Ital- 

 ian bees, the German bee-culturists have 

 bred the Cyprians, the Dalmatians, the 

 Smyrnians, the Ilerzegovinins, the Egypt- 

 ians, and tlie Carnolian, Krainer, and heath 

 bees.— Ed.] 



For the American Bee Journal. 



My Bees. 



It is hardly safe to make a report for the 

 year before the middle of May when all 

 trouble from "springing" is over. I started 

 the spring of 18T(') with 34 colonies, took 1600 

 lbs. of honey, mostly extracted, and in- 

 creased to 98— on hand the middle of May, 

 1877. To enter more into detail, I took 1700 

 lbs. of honey but fed back 100 lbs. of comb 

 honey in frames this spring. I increased to 

 100, but one of the latest did not succeed in 

 raising a queen, or rather it was lost on its 

 wedding trip. As an experiment, I put this 

 hive in the cellar with a small number of 

 bees and they were very properly all dead 

 by spring. This really made the number of 

 colonies put into winter quarters at 99, and 

 these 99 came out alive. One of them died 

 after bringing out, so that I have lost only 

 one out or the 99, and have 98 to start the 

 season with. One of these I found with a 

 young queen unfertile, but I gave it brood 

 and it has now raised another young queen 

 about ready to lay. As it had plenty of 

 bees, I count upon it as a good colony. 



On Nov. 1.5th, Ilichard, the hired man, 

 commenced carrying in the hives and tak- 

 ing in a few each evening and morning had 

 them all in the cellar by Nov. 2lst, where 

 they remained till soft maples were in blos- 

 soni— April 10— and were all out by April 

 13, after nearly .5 months confinement. For 

 ventilating the cellar, a chimney of brick 

 and stone ran from the ground to the top of 

 the house, and a hole in the chimney near 

 the ceiling of the cellar received a stove- 



