108 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



same, I have concluded to annihilate him iu 



plain, English, thus: 



'•Howling, roaring', anri a thousand groans, 

 Expressed his torments in most dismal tones." 



Cicero de Finibus, ii, 29. 



Profoundly, your "very learned and lumi- 

 nous servant," F. Varko. 

 Canton, Pa., October 12, 1867. 



[Frum the Iowa Homestead.] 



Luck in Bee-keeping— Drones and Moths. 



Editor Iowa Homestead : When I was 

 twelve j'ears old my father told me that as he 

 could never have any luck with bee;^, I might 

 buy a swarm and have it for myself; and in 

 those days bees would not do anything without 

 you bought somebody's luck, and you must not 

 pay money for bees, but if possible exchange 

 sheep for them, &.c. I could find plenty of 

 swarms at three dollars each, but they would 

 not sell their lucky swarms. I finally found a 

 widow who sold me her lucky swarm for seven 

 dollars' worth of hemlock lumber, with a ver- 

 bal agreement that I was to have her luck with 

 it. The consequence to her proved to be bad, 

 for her bees would swarm and go into the 

 woods, &c ; but I had the best of luck. I kept 

 that swarm twelve years in the same comb, and 

 1 never failed to have two swarms and some- 

 times three every season, and a box of honey 

 from my old swarm. My young swarms would 

 do well the first season, but only once in awhile 

 one that would do as well as tlie old one the 

 second season. I soon began to study what 

 made that swarm always have a fertile queen 

 — always be lucky — simply because the comb 

 was built right; every comb was straight, and 

 every comb was a brood comb. If y. u get the 

 hive in the right form, and attend to the build- 

 ing of the comb the first season, you will have 

 all lucky swarms. I make all lucky swarms 

 now, and I do not consider a swarm in proper 

 working order until it is made into a lucky 

 swarm. There is no need of having small 

 swarms in the fall t') double; the summer is the 

 time to fix up your bees for winter — fall is too 

 late. Again, I want you to understand that I 

 do not claim that the hive I use is the best, by 

 any means; but my method of building up 

 swarms is correct, I care not who says to the 

 contrary. That is the method I have recom- 

 mendetl: We will suppose that you allow your 

 bees to swarm naturally; well, here is a large 

 swarm that come out when the basswood is in 

 lull bloom. The bees make comb very rapidly, 

 and fill their hive with comb in eight days, as 

 1 have known them to do; at least one-third of 

 said comb will be drone, or store comb, which is 

 good for nothing for raising woikers next sea- 

 son; or, we will say a second swarm comes out 

 at the same time Avith a young queen; it will 

 take her some time to come up to her full breeding 

 (lapacity; if they fill the hive, th«re will be more 

 honey than bees, and large quantities of the 

 ccaiib is built for stores, &;c. Neither of those 

 swarms will be lucky swarms, either for raising 

 bees or storing honey, just so long as you keep 

 the comb in that condition; and here I will let 



some of my bee-keeping friends into a secret — 

 that is, if you do not have any more drone 

 comb in eaclithive than you want, (which is but 

 very little, whcreyou keep a number of swarms), 

 your bees will not be expending time and honey 

 raising drones, and you will not have to pay a 

 patent-right man anything for his drone trap; 

 in other words, if j-ou do not raise drones you 

 will not have them to catch, on the same prin- 

 ciple that if you do not raise any moths you 

 have not got to catch them with a patent moth 

 trap. I never lost a swarm by flight or with 

 the moths, because I keep lucky swarms, I sup- 

 pose. E. Gallup. 

 Osage, Iowa. 



_— ^ 



For the American Bee Journal. 



Can Italian Bees be Improved? 



Dear Journal: Having been a reader of 

 your columns for a year or so, I have become 

 somewhat acquainted with j'our numerous cor- 

 respondents, and feel rather inclined to be reck- 

 oned as at least a sort of second cousin in the 

 family. And since one of the family "living 

 some miles from land, away out from shore," 

 who has raised an Italian queen which pro- 

 duced a worker progeny^ with four yellow bauds, 

 instead of the usual number of three, and thus 

 became the t>bject of a criticism by a brother, 

 namely, "raising Italians more than pure,'''' I 

 wish to say a word on the subject of purity of 

 varieties, and the improvement of the sanre. 



For the last five years I have been experi- 

 menting with the Italian variety, and have re- 

 ceived queens from ]Mr. Langstroth three or 

 four times; and have bred from a queen raised 

 by Mr. Colvin, of Baltimore; also from one 

 from an apiary in the north part of this State; 

 and likewise from one of six queens which were 

 brought here by Prof. Harrison, of Ohio. 



In these experiments I think I have verified 

 the following facts: 



First. That the Italian bee can be improved 

 just as easily as any other animal, and by the 

 same means. That is, by selecting the largest, 

 brightest-colored, most prolific, best tempered, 

 and best honey-gatherers, and breeding only 

 from such colonics as have these qualities. 



Let this be done from year to year by every 

 apiarian, and the man that lives "several miles 

 from land" will not be the only one who will 

 raise qiteens '■'more than pxirey 



One year ago last September, I received my 

 beautiful queen from Rev. Mr. Langstroth, that 

 breeds workers fully up to the standard. In 

 size the workers are pcrceptibl}' larger than any 

 of the old black variety tbat lever saw. In 

 color, they have, without exception, three yel- 

 low bauds, whicli are always visible, whether 

 the bees are loaded with honey or not; and the 

 remaining bands are of a whitish yellow, so 

 that the bee presents a yellowish color through- 

 out. When 1 saw the progeny of this qucyn, I 

 thought I had drawn a prize. The young queens 

 raised from her weie nearly all higlily colored, 

 with one of a darker hue occasionally. Alter 

 I commenced breeding from her last spring, I 

 observed one day pouring lorlh from a colony 



