200 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



[For the American* 1 



Yellow Bands. 



Jourual.] 



On pn,i;e 141, are two columns of questions, 

 quiM-if's, and answers. Lina, Baroness of Ber- 

 ]('[is(li, siys — "The Italian bee bred in Italy has 

 j;fnrially but two yellow bands, and, including 

 tlie narrow strip next the thorax, three. But 

 Dzierzon has raised a much more beautiful race. 

 Tlie workers of his full-blooded bees have three 

 yellow bands, exclusive of the narrow strip." 



In the next column. Querist asks— "Are three 

 yellow bands a proper test ?" Mr. Nesbit answers 

 ■ — "That is considered a test by the best apiarians 

 both in America and in Europe." This answer 

 is hardly satisfactory, because it involves still an- 

 other test. We want to know what constitutes 

 the beM? I have asked this question before. We 

 want this as a test for them, that we may know 

 whom to follow. 



Dzierzon's "full-blooded bees have three bands 

 exclusive of the narrow strip " But in Italy, 

 where these very bees were obtained, they have 

 but two ; and now, after he has succeeded in 

 breeding, through several generations, a lighter 

 color than the original, should he advertise that 

 four bands were the only test of purity, and con- 

 sidered so "by the best apiarians," and the pure 

 are in his hands and you must come to him for 

 them, it would be as consistent as very many of 

 our folks are. When we find who " the best api- 

 arians" are, we will inquire of them if it is pos- 

 sible for any of those of our imported queens that 

 come from a district ichere no blackbees are known, 

 are pure, althougii they show less than four 

 bands ? or if those that Mr. Orimm imported and 

 described are so? 



It is possible that very light bees may be pure ; 

 but I dislike the idea of denying parentage because 

 of a change. Possibly this very change in cohn- 

 — call it improvement — may prove a degeneracy 

 in vigor. We can trace great changes in tlie vege- 

 table kingdom. In the rose, dahlia, and hundreds 

 of other flowers, the five petals, by means of the 

 stamens, are multiplied to hundreds, increasing 

 the beauty, but at the expense of the seeds. I 

 hope that as we increase the beauty of our queens 

 by pale golden tints, we shall not, in the same 

 ratio, decrease their fertility. 



Gravenhorst, who has sent ver}' many of our 

 queens to us, says, " We liave paid much less re- 

 gard to color than to other qualities, such as ac- 

 tivity, industry, prolificness, disposition, &c." 



Although puritj' is so easily proved bj' the " best 

 Skpiarists," can it be as easily shown that these 

 very pure ones of fourth proof show any better 

 results, store more honej^, increase faster, behave 

 better, defend themselves with more vigor, or on 

 the whole possess more desirable qualities? Let 

 us look to this. M. Quinby. 



jSt. Johnsville, iV. Y. 



It is a wise arrangement that the second swarm 

 does not ordinarily issue until all the eggs lelt by 

 the fiist queen are hatched, and the young mostly 

 sealed over, so as to require no fnrther feeding. 

 Its departure earlier than this, would leave too fev,- 

 laborers to attend to the wants of the young bees. 

 — Langstroth. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



The Indian Bees. 



]Mr Editor :— The article in the Jotjknal for 

 November, on the '•' Ferocity of the Indian Bees," 

 is not calculated to inspire one Avith a longing de- 

 sire to obtain them. One statement, however, 

 gives me some hope that they may be domesti- 

 cated, viz.: "the nests in the church steeple." 

 This is a favorite resort with our black bees, 

 and probably with the Italian, and leads me to 

 hope that they have other habits in common. It 

 may be that the apis dorsnta in India is more 

 dangerous than those in the islands of the Malay 

 archipelago. The following, taken fmm the 

 " Malay Archij^elago,''' bj?- Alfred Eussell Wallace, 

 will doubtless interest many of your subscribers : 

 Of the products and exports of tlie island of 

 Timor, he states: "Besides ponies, almost the 

 only exports of Timor are sandal wood and bees- 

 wax. The sandal wood (santalum alb) is the 

 produce of a small tree, which grows sparingly 

 in the mountains of Timor and many of the other 

 islands of the far East. * * * "The beeswax 

 is a still more important and valuable product, 

 formed by the wild bees, (Apis dorsata,) which 

 build huge honey combs, suspended in the open 

 air from the under side of the lofty branches of 

 the highest trees. These are of a semicircular 

 form, and often three or four feet in diameter. 



"I once saw the natives take a bees' nest, 

 and a very interesting sight it was. In the 

 valley where I used to collect insects, I one day 

 saw three or four Timorese men and boys under 

 a high tree, and looking up, saw on a very lofty 

 horizontal branch three large bees' combs. The 

 tree was straight and smooth-barked, without a 

 branch till at seventy or eighty feet from the 

 ground it gave out the limb which the bees had 

 chosen for their home. As the men were evi- 

 dently looking after the bees, I waited to watch 

 their operations. One of them first produced a 

 long piece of wood, apparently the stem of a 

 small tree or creeper, which he had brought with 

 him, and began splitting it through in several 

 directitms, which showed that it was tough and 

 stringy. He then wrapped it in palm leaves, 

 which were secured by twisting a slender creeper 

 round them. He then fastened his cloth tightly 

 round his loins; and, producing another cloth, 

 wrapped it round his head, neck, and body, and 

 tied it firmly lound his neck, leaving his face, 

 arms, and legs completely bare. Slung from his 

 girdle he carried a long thin coil of cord ; and 

 while he had been making these preparations, 

 one of his companions had cut a strong creep<"r 

 or bush-rope eight or ten yards long, to one end 

 of which the wood-torch was fastened and lighted 

 at the bottom, emitting a steady stream of smoke. 

 Just above the torch a chopping-knife was fast- 

 ened by a short cord. 



" The bee-hunter now took hold of the Imsli- 

 rope just a'love the torch, and passed the other 

 end round the trunk of the tree, holding one end 

 in each hand. Jerking it up the tree a little above 

 his head, beset his foot against the trunk, and 

 leaning back, began walking up it. It was won- 

 derful to see lh(; skill with which he took ad- 

 vantage of the slightest irregularities of the bark 



