194 



THE AMERICAN APICUL TURIS T. 



firm the i)rob:ibility of such an lul- 

 mixtiue. 



The ox[)crieiico(.l queen-breeder 

 does not look lo the worker bees 

 of Mijy race or strain of bees I'or 

 typical markings. He will inva- 

 riably scan the queen and drone 

 progeny. II they present consid- 

 erable uniformity of markings he 

 knows that the stock is a fair repre- 

 sentative of the race-type or strain 

 to which it belongs. For instance : 

 the Carniolans, as I have seen, 

 and as Mr. Frank Benton has stat- 

 ed, present quite uniformly marked 

 workers, but many of the queens 

 are "as yellow as Italians." See 

 his briellct entitled " Bees," dated 

 Jan. 20, 18yG. I have also seen pure 

 Carniolan drones finely marked 

 with yellow similar to Cyprian 

 drones. My inference that the 

 race is an original cross with the 

 C3'prians is founded upon the state- 

 ments of Mr. Benton in regard to 

 the results of crossing these races. 

 I have been unable to find them 

 among my papers, but they prove 

 coiiclusivel}' the close relationshi[) 

 of the Carniolans to the Cypri- 

 ans. 



It would be useless to speculate 

 how the original crosses were made 

 whether by the hand of man or in 

 the course of nature ; most proba- 

 bly the former. The introduction 

 of a few Cyprians into Carniola 

 within the last thousand years 

 would be sufiicient to modify the 

 existing strain of black bees, if a 

 small Cyprian a[)iary had been es- 

 tablished as would have been prob- 

 able in case of an importation. 



As, to the Italians, not only are 

 there black bees and "natives, 

 too," as Mr. Benton remarks, in 

 Italy, but Italian queens and drones 

 present unmistakable admixture of 

 black l)lood. I have yet to see 

 the Italian ((ueen, and I do not 

 believe such a queen can be found, 

 either high-bred or imported, that 

 will not produce an occasional 



(pieen, say one out of fifty (gener- 

 ally more) having one, two or 

 more dark stripes across the top 

 of the abdomen and among her 

 drones a few that are dark. All 

 such (queens and drones will speed- 

 ily develop black bees, and it will 

 not ])c necessary to carry out the 

 ex[)eriment to satisfy any experi- 

 enced queen-breeder ot the result, 

 whether my friend Mr. J. Ya. Tond, 

 jr., believes it or not. The so-called 

 leather-colored Italians simply rep- 

 resent a greater per cent of black 

 blood than do the light-colored 

 bees. 



The above facts will convince all, 

 I think, that no harm will come 

 from the crossing of any of our 

 present races of bees. They will 

 further show how very great is the 

 field for improvement to the in- 

 telligent queen-breeder. There is 

 one other fact in this connection 

 that I must not fail to note, and 

 that is that a very gentle strain of 

 bees can be produced from any 

 two of our races of bees that may 

 be selected, although the first ^e\\ 

 crosses will be often ugly. This I 

 have proved with blacks and Ital- 

 ians, with Syrians and blacks, with 

 Syrians and Italians and with Cyp- 

 rians and Syrio-Albino bees. 



The writer is particularly inter- 

 ested in cross-bred bees, believing 

 that the most valuable and the 

 most beautiful bees of the future 

 will be produced by intelligent 

 crossing. But let no one think 

 that I do not value the Carnio- 

 lans. They have many good traits 

 and some very bad ones. They 

 have the marked characteristics of 

 the black race, one of the most 

 objectionable being the disposition 

 to rear too many drones ^^^he 

 building of too much drone comb. 

 Though they be given a full set 

 of worker combs they find no dif- 

 ficulty in rearing hosts of drones. 

 In this respect the Carniolans can 

 easily discount every other race. 



