176 



THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



could have been produced. Tlie Ital- 

 ian bee lias a trace of black blood in 

 it that can be bred to a black strain 

 as easily as the yellow blood in ti)e 

 Carniolans can be bred to a pure yel- 

 low strain. 



The Italian bee, though not a pure 

 race, has certain well known mark- 

 ings. It has three yellow bands and 

 three glassy black bands on the ab- 

 domen, and the color of the hairs on 

 the body varies from yellow to white. 

 At the present time the most noted 

 breeders in this country are breeding 

 the white-banded Italian bee and con- 

 sider them not onl}- the most beauti- 

 ful but the best workers. Such are the 

 celebrated stock of Mr. Alley, Mr. 

 Gary and others who are breeding 

 the finest Italian bees. In appear- 

 ance they are so nearly like my Sy- 

 rio-Albinos that I would defy anyone 

 to come into my apiar}^ and tell one 

 from the other. 



I have called my new strain the Sy- 

 rio-Albino, to distinguish it, but have 

 steadily bred to the standard type of 

 the Italians, so that I may make nevv 

 crosses at any time and introduce new 

 blood without getting a lot of mon- 

 grel bees as the result. 



Recently I have made several cross- 

 es with Mr. Gary's Italians producing 

 as fine and regularly marked bees as 

 were ever bred. And I expect to be 

 able another year to make the same 

 splendid crosses with Mr. Alley's in- 

 valuable strain, as the queen he sent 

 me (a daughter of his famous one hun- 

 dred dollar queen) is of the white- 

 haired variety of Italian^ and pro- 

 duces beautifully marked white bred 

 bees. 



Why it is that we have queen breed- 

 ers who are breeding a so-called Ital- 

 ian bee with markings and coloi'ing 

 different from the recognized standard 

 of the Italians, some breeding all red 

 bees, some four and five yellow band- 

 ed and some with solid yellow abdo- 

 . mens is a mystery to me, for every 

 cross with the standard Italians will 

 produce as irregularly marked bees 



as any hybrids. Then these highly 

 colored bees are confessedly produced 

 by in-and-in breeding, are mostly un- 

 dersized and scarcely any of them are 

 capable of producing a choice article 

 of comb honey, their really valuable 

 qualities being sacrificed in attaining 

 the one object of color. 



As to the matter of beautiful bees 

 I fully agree with Mr. Vandruff who 

 gives his views in a very able commu- 

 nicalion io \\\q American Bee Journal 

 (see page 602) . He says ^'I think this 

 breeding for extremes of any color 

 by our queen breeders is a great mis- 

 take. The more tiiey run to the ex- 

 tremes of very yellow or very white 

 or black the less good qualities they 

 possess. I am well satisfied it results 

 in deterioration in size as well as in 

 many other good qualities and is a 

 failure in getting a beautiful bee. 



Neio Phila., Ohio. 



Introducing queens. 



Joshua Bull. 



On the 16thof last August Ireceived 

 from the Bay State Apiary two of the 

 brightest yellow Italian queens that I 

 ever saw. They were large and fine ; 

 and if color counts for anything they 

 are superlatively beautiful. 



To introduce one of them, I re- 

 moved the old queen from a colony, 

 and placed the cage containing the 

 new queen above the frames and al- 

 lowed the bees to liberate her by eat- 

 ing out the candy, according to direc- 

 tions sent with the cage, and in about 

 one week she commented laying. This 

 is a very simple way of introduction, 

 and no doubt would prove successful 

 in most cases. But when a colony is 

 in just the right condition for it, there 

 is a still more simple and expeditious 

 way, which is attended with less un- 

 certainty, and saves time in getting 

 the queen to la3'ing, as I will endeavor 

 to show through the method by which 

 I introduced the other one of those 

 two queens mentioned above. It 



