84 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



from transverse slats placed loosely behind one 

 another in the upper space of the bee-hive, by 

 which he was enabled as often as he pleased to 

 examine the whole of the combs in a hive one 

 after the other, the interior of the hive being 

 rendered accessible by taking away a movable 

 back or front wall — as by this arrangement each 

 individual comb, clinging from beneath to the 

 loose transverse slat, can be taken out with this, 

 examined on both sides, and again suspended 

 in its place without injury. By the help of this 

 ingenious arrangement, it had become possible 

 not merely to trace what went on in a bee-hive 

 from day to day, or from hour to hour, he could 

 even convince himself most exactly Avith his 

 own oyijs at any time, as to what was taking 

 place in every individual cell in the ditfcrent 

 combs in his hives. He was also enabled in 

 this wa}^ to procure a knowledge of all the pro- 

 ceedings of the workers in the interior of the 

 hive between the combs, and also to witness 

 the doings of the queen bee. These were all 

 advantages which even the celebrated hives 

 with glass walls could not in the least present, 

 as these latter bee-liives only permitted the 

 surface of a single comb, which was turned to- 

 wards the glass to be inspected, but otherwise 

 allowed only a very small and extremely im- 

 perfect insight into the interior of a colony of 

 bees. 



Dzierzon could give the most exact account 

 of the condition of his bee-hives. He knew the 

 number and the kind of cells which were daily 

 or hourly supplied with eggs by the queen; he 

 knew in wliat time the larvse in the eggs ar- 

 rived at their exclusion; he was enabled to 

 watch the gradual growth of the larva?; he could 

 exactly ascertain what kind of feed was fur- 

 nished to this or that larva by the workers; he 

 could acquire the most positive information as 

 to the time of preparation of a bee-larva, as to 

 the period of the escape of the bee from the 

 covered cell, and as to the number and nature 

 of the queen cells; in this way he was always 

 informed in what condition the queen govern- 

 ing a bee-hive was; he could detect every dis- 

 turbance, every irregularity, which induced by 

 multifarious circumstances, easily occurs in the 

 well-ordered economy of a hive, as quickly as 

 its cause. 



What advantages this must have afforded to 

 an apiarian endowed with such an acute and un- 

 prejudiced power of observation as Dzierzon, 

 may easily be imagined. By this agency the 

 most important and instructive information re- 

 garding the proceedings of a bee colony might 

 flow in upon that acute observer, and it could 

 not but happen that at last the extremely re- 

 markable and concealed process of the repro- 

 duction of the bees would be correctly penetra- 

 ted by the eye of man. But even for practice 

 the Dzierzon bee-hives were of the greatest im- 

 portance, for Dzierzon could know exactly, at 

 any time, and of any one of his bee-hives, how 

 strongly it was peopled, how industrious its 

 inhabitants were, and what they were occupied 

 with. He could always inform himself whether 

 the number of workers was in proportion to 

 that of the brood produced by the queen, 

 whether the number or presence of drone larvae 



was or was not useful to the hive, whether the 

 necessary store of food was present, &c. With 

 all this the intelligent bee-keeper and possessor 

 of Dzierzon hives, by the aid of which a com- 

 plete insight into the state of each household of 

 bees might be attained, could exercise a cor- 

 recting and directing action by adding the 

 wanting number of necessary workers to a hive 

 which was poor in Avorkers, or taking away 

 some of the combs filled with eggs and brood 

 from scantily peopled hive, so as to lighten its 

 work, and hanging them in an abundantly peo- 

 pled hive for furUier care. The careful bee- 

 keeper now knew from Avhat hives he had to 

 remove the combs Hlled with drone-larva? which 

 were either unnecessary or dangerous; he was 

 enabled to save a hive, the inhabitants of which, 

 although otherwise industrious, threatened to 

 become demoralized by the loss of their queen 

 from this dangerous state of anarchy, by taking 

 care to replace this loss where the bees them- 

 selves omitted to do so. In short with the as- 

 sistance of Dzierzon's hives, an experienced 

 and careful bee-keeper may go to work like- an 

 intelligent gardener, who, by cutting away the 

 unnecessary roots, and attending properly to 

 the bud-bearing twigs, prepares and supports 

 his trees for the production of a rich harvest of 

 fruit. 



In turning to the more exact exposition of 

 Dzierzon's theory of the reproduction of bees, 

 I give prominence to the most important points 

 in the history of their propagation, upon the es- 

 tablishment of which Dzierzon must have laid 

 particular stress, as a number of the proceed- 

 ings in a bee-hive relating to reproduction can 

 only find their correct explanation and elucida- 

 tion if we maintain that the young tin fecundated 

 queen never copulates in the bee-hive, but always 

 outside of tJiis, high ujj in the air. I pass over 

 the lively dispute which has been carried on 

 amongst bee-keepers from time immemorial for 

 the defence or rejection of this point, and only 

 refer to the fact a queen has never been sur- 

 prised in the act of copulation within the bee- 

 Inve by any apiarian who has obtained an in- 

 sight into the interior of a hive by the emploj'- 

 ment of Dzierzon's hives. The drones as long 

 as they remain in tlie hive are always extremely 

 sluggish insects which are not even roused 

 fiom their quietude and phlegm by the prox- 

 imity of a queen desirous of copulation; on the 

 other hand, when a warm, clear, and still day 

 has allured them out into the open air, the 

 sexual and copulative impulse is awakened in 

 the highest degree in these otherwise sluggish 

 drones. They rove through the genial air high 

 over their hives with a loud humming to attract 

 the attention of a queen, who would be im- 

 pelled to take her Avedding-flight by the same 

 favorable Aveather. At any rate, very fcAV of 

 the many thousand drones attain the longed-for 

 happiness of being selected and accepted by a 

 queen for a husb;ind, it being well-known that 

 the number of female bees is very small in pro- 

 portion to the great number of male individ- 

 uals. But by means of this disproportion, the 

 fcAV female bees on taking their Avedding-fiight, 

 are always sure of attaining their object, as 

 from the number of drones roving through the 



