394 ITALIAN HONEY BEE. 



practicing the theory which he advances. It also 

 proves conclusively to my mind that the theory is not 

 well founded ; or, at least, is of no practical value. 



Mr. Langstroth says p. 43, " Hive and Honey 

 Bee" that " all the leading facts in the breeding of 

 bees ought to be as familiar to the apiarian, as the 

 same class of facts in the rearing of domestic ani- 

 mals." In this opinion I fully concur. Hence I 

 make the following extract from the same work, for 

 the purpose of correcting what I conceive would be 

 an error in practice, (though not in fact) that ought 

 never to have been recommended to bee-keepers. 



" Dzierzon found that a queen which had been 

 refrigerated for a long time, after being brought to 

 life by warmth, laid only male eggs, whilst previously 

 she had also laid female eggs. Berlepsch refrigerat- 

 ed three queens by placing them thirty-six hours in 

 an ice house, two of which never revived, and the 

 third laid, as before, thousands of eggs, but /row all 

 of them only males were evolved. In two instances, 

 Mr. Mahan has, at my suggestion, tried similar ex- 

 periments, and with like results. It does not seem 

 to have occurred to the German -apiarians that l>y this 

 refrigerating process, we may secure as many Italian 

 drones as we need. 



" All that is necessary is to convert by it one or 

 more of the queens of the nuclei into drone layers. 

 The reception of an Italian queen quite late in the 

 season may thus be turned to good account." 



Exclusively drone laying queens, as well as fer- 

 tile workers, are monstrosities ; then whv seek to 



