THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



131 



[For tlie Amevican Bee Jourual ] 



Various Items. 



Editor Bek Journal :—Aftin- gonding you 

 my IcUcrof iScptcmber IStli, Irom Bellinzona, 

 Ciuiton Tc'ssiu, I visited a great ininiber of 

 jipiarics in tlic iieigliljorliood of BcllinzoTia, 

 Aviioic Prof. IMoua bought swarms to got the 

 (|uccns be was ooustantly sending olF. I liad 

 llius an opportunity to sec and compare abo.ut 

 thirty more queens, besides the hundred "which 

 the Professor l)ud packed or was packing for 

 me. I am positive that there were not two 

 of them exactly alike in color and size. I have 

 seen all shades of color, from one whose abdo- 

 men was brown-yellow or leather colored, except 

 the ]ioint, down to perfect black ones. The 

 large-sized queens were usually handsomer than 

 the smaller ones, which were either perfectly 

 black, or had but very narrow yellow rings, 

 where the workers have their three rings. The 

 yelloAV rings were narrower on these queens, 

 than on their worker progeny. With all this 

 diirereucc of color and size in ciueens, 1 could 

 not lind a perceptible dill'erence as fur as tlie 

 workers are concerned. When 1 supposed I 

 had found a diiferencc, and examined the 

 swarm more closely, 1 could cjuiekly satisfy 

 mj^self that the workers I saw at the entrance 

 ol tiie hive were merely older bees than those 

 I saw in front of neighboring hives. Being 

 fidly satislled that, at least as far as I went,, no 

 common or blade Lees could be found, 1 conclu- 

 ded to examine drones only, thereafter. All the 

 drones I was able to lind at tliat time, (Sept. 

 IG — 18) were of course old ones, and I could 

 not perceive the least difference. They seemed 

 to me to be smaller than the common black 

 drones, and differed so little in color from each 

 other, tliat an inexperienced observer Avould 

 have mistaken them for black drones. All the 

 difference consisted in three very narrow stripes 

 on the edge of the first three rings of the abdo- 

 men, where the worker has the black edge to 

 the yellow bands. By very close examination, 

 liowever, I found some brown spots ou those 

 parts of tlie first three rings, where the workers 

 have the yellow bands. Mr. Uhle told me that 

 these spots are more visible when the drones 

 are young. 



Comparing my own former view with the 

 statements of Mr. Dzierzon (who, by the waj^ 

 does not claim that he ever saw Italj-, or the 

 bees there), that the Italian bee in Italy itself 

 is not perfectly pure, Avith my present observa- 

 tions, 1 must concede that 1 was mistaken. I 

 am now fully satisfied that the Italian bee, at 

 least in the neighborliood where I have examin- 

 ed it, is a pure distinct breed— distinct from the 

 black bee, however much the queens may dilier 

 in color and size. If this were not so, Iioav 

 could the workers of a perfectly black queen 

 (one of those which I showed to Dr. S. fejjuiford, 

 of Lima, Ohio,) be exactly of the same color 

 as those of the brightest queen? IMuch rather 

 do I now believe that the golden-colored queens 

 are iu some way btfstardized. Dr. Ziwanski 

 writes, in his annual report to the German Bce- 

 Kecpcrs' Convention, for 1&U5, " AVhoevcr ex- 



pects an original Italian cjucen light or yellow 

 colored, deceives him'self. They are all ot 

 them more dark than light, almost black, and 

 one who docs not knov? them, would find it 

 difficult to discover any difference, nay, would 

 I)crhaps find a common queen lighter colored 

 than an Italian. The ligbter and the more 

 splendidly yellow an Italian queen looks 

 (those Irom Pollegio never look soj, the greater 

 ground there is tor suspicion." All the dought- 

 ers of originally imported Cjueens are dark 

 again, but produce the prettiest Avorkers. Mi". 

 Dathe, who, however, never saw Italy nor the 

 bees there, agrees with Dzierzon, who considers 

 only those queens pure that are perfectly yellow, 

 and then says, on the next page of his pamphlet, 

 "When we declare the pretty yelloAV colored 

 Italian race as the pure full-blood race, we do 

 not mean to say that the darker or browner 

 colored race is less valuable in a practical view. 

 We find everywhere iu nature the lighter color 

 more noble and tender, the darker more durable. 

 jSo are the darker queens less tender.''^ Travelers 

 in that portion of the country where the striped 

 Ligurian bee is found, reported in former years 

 inUie (jlerman Bieneuzeituug, that the nicest 

 colored bees were found in the neighborhood 

 of Lago Maggiore. Shall w^e then take the 

 Italian bees lOund in this part of Italy as the 

 standard of Italian bees ? Or shall we accept 

 as the standard Dzierzon's bees, who succeeded 

 in propagating higher colored queens from the 

 original fmported stock V As I have more than 

 forty queens which I imported from Italy, 

 safely introduced in my apiary, I shall have the 

 means of making more careful examinations 

 next summer. If I do not lose them during the 

 winter, I will in due time send further reports. 



Prof. Moka's Experience on Nice Queens. 



Conversing Avith Prof. Mona, one day, about 

 the beautiful golden yelloAV colored queens sold 

 in America, "he related the following: "We 

 had a pretty nice ciueen this spring, and intend- 

 ed to breed from her, as our customers in Ger- 

 many often ordered nice colored queens ; but 

 we had so many crippled and deficient queens 

 from her progeny, a number of which never 

 laid an egg, and also three whose eggs never 

 hatched, that Ave rejected her as unfit to breed 

 from. We are convinced that the darker queens 

 arc hardier and more prolific." I must add 

 that ou my return from Europe, I found in my 

 apiary four of those pretty yelloAV ciueeus whose 

 eggs Avould never hatch. One of tbem was de- 

 suoyed in the presence of Mr. Crowfoot, ot 

 Hartford, Wisconsin. 



A Colony of Italian Bees in a very Shall 

 Hive. 



On the 13th of July, 1865, I hived a small 

 second SAvarm in a hive eight inches high, ten 

 inches Avide, and sixteen inches long, contain- 

 ing eleven frames six by eight inches in the 

 clear. This little second SAvarm filled its hive 

 with combs, and stored honey enough toAvinter 

 on. In the spring of 1SG6, it Avas so weak that 

 it could brood only on one comb during the 

 month of April. It however multiplied so rap- 

 idly afterward, that it filled two top boxes with 

 honey Avcighing tAventy-four pounds, and had 



