THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



175 



Lome. I heard an old bee-man say a 

 few months ago tliat he believed that 

 drones would congregate at certain 

 places and queens would meet them 

 there, from the fact that he had at a 

 certain place several tinies heard the 

 roaring, (h'one lii^e hum. I have read 

 other evidences to the same effect. 

 Of course it is understood that, if it 

 is so, this is nature's method of pre- 

 venting in-and-in breeding. I cer- 

 tainly would not want to warrant a 

 queen if there sliould be blacit bees 

 within four miles of my apiary, even 

 though a majority of my queens sliould 

 mate witii drones born in the same 

 apiary. You, no doubt, are certain 

 that your Carniolan queens were 

 mated with drones from your own 

 apiary. Thougli I know not all the 

 circumstances yet I doubt it. The 

 siin[)le fact that you are certain need 

 not convince me. You ought to iiiiow 

 better than I, and you may be right, 

 but I cannot but doubt that yon can 

 properly be sure there were no for- 

 eign drones in your vicinity when tlie 

 queens, from which your yellow Car- 

 niolans came, were fertilized. 

 Mechanicsburg , III. 



LSee reply under Notes and Comments.] 



Italian bees. 

 Are they the most beautiful? 



Dr. G. L. Tinker. 



The Itaban bee when crossed with 

 otlier races ma}^ be bred into a great 

 variety of colored and marked bees. 

 Wide extremes in the color of the yel- 

 low and black bands and in the color 

 of the hairs of the body are easily 

 produced. The yellovv bands may 

 vary from a deep orange red to a 

 light lemon yellow. The black may 

 vary from a light brown to a deep 

 glossy black and the color of the hairs 

 from rusty red to yellow and a i)ure 

 white. 



But no such wide range in these 

 colors and markings can l)e made bv 

 select breeding of the pure Italian 



bee. A cross with the Cyprian will 

 give the deep orange red, the all red 

 abdomen of the drones, queens and 

 workers with red liairs all over and 

 complete obliteration of the black 

 bands seen on the Italian bee. These 

 bees also buihl their combs and cap 

 them like the Cyprians, also they pre- 

 sent the well known water-soaked ap- 

 pearance. 



The same general character of bee 

 can be developed from a cross with 

 the Syrian, the color being a light 

 lemon yellow instead of a deep red. 

 The Albinos or white-haired bees 

 are the result of certain crosses of the 

 imported Italians having well mai'ked 

 traces of the blood of the black or 

 G-erman bee. The first imported Ital- 

 ian queen I got some ten years since 

 produced white-banded workers and 

 very dark white-haired drones, and it 

 was from the drones of this queen and 

 her daughters that my strain of Al- 

 bino bees was originated; the drones 

 being crossed upon the daughters of 

 a fine Syrian queen. Some of the 

 daughters of this imported queen were 

 almost black and a black strain of 

 bees could undoubtedly have been 

 bred from her. As my first crosses 

 were made late in the season when no 

 other drones were in existence I could 

 hardly be mistaken in the results. 

 From these crosses I got many white- 

 haired yellow-banded bees, and many 

 that would pass for the average hy- 

 brid from the same queen. Continu- 

 ing the cross by selecting the white- 

 haired yellow-bainled queens it was 

 not many years till the ty|)ical white- 

 banded Italian marked bee was pro- 

 duced, the direct descent of the moth- 

 er stock being Syrian. These bees 

 have been several times crossed with 

 noted strains of Italians until after 

 eight years of breeding I have my 

 present stock of Syrio- Albinos. 



That white-haired bees have been 

 originated from the im|)orted Italian 

 bees by other breeders is certain and 

 it is just as certain that from the same 

 imported queens a black strain of bees 



