1871.] 



THE AMEEICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



123 



rather darkish in color, considerably so when 

 compared with our AmericaTiized Italians. 

 Their abdomens are long, tapering, and they 

 Carry them well up on a level. The queens are 

 extra prolific, almost invariably. The drones 

 are, as a rule, smaller and very dark colored ; in 

 fact seem almost coal black and glossy a little 

 way off. But if we examine them closely, we 

 see their color tinged with a dark orange hue ; 

 and scarcely any hair on their abdomen visible 

 to the naked eye. Our Americanized Italian 

 queens on the other hand, arc a light yellow, and 

 not very prolific. The workers are a light yellow, 

 and if they come up to the standard, very light 

 colored. The abdomen is not so long and taper 

 as that of the pure Italian brought from Italy ; 

 and when they are fanning in front of their hives, 

 there appears to be a sort of joint in the abdo- 

 men. When we come to the Americanized 

 drone, we have an extra large hairy fellow. 

 Some of them very bright yellow, and of dif- 

 ferent shades of color, &c., 6zc. 



Now, we will start with a jjure imported 

 Italian queen. We raise queens from her, and 

 they are fertilized with black drones. Yet some 

 of them produce all thiee-striiled workers. We 

 select such to breed from, and we have the 

 Americanized Italian. Now we keep selecting 

 the lightest colored and largest drones, &c. 

 (This is about the way it is dohe.) 



Again, we start with a black or common queen. 

 She mates with an Italian drone ; and then we 

 breed from this queen up to the fourth genera- 

 tion, and all her successors mate with Italian 

 drones, and we again have the Americanized 

 Italian to perfection. 



All .this is done by accepting three-striped 

 workers, and selecting the lightest colored 

 queens, and rejecting the dark colored ones. 

 We have at present in our yard two queens that 

 are admired by visitors as models of purity. 

 Yet we know that their grandmothers were raised 

 from an impure mother, and fertilized by a black 

 drone. !>till the workeis fri.m those two queens 

 are perfect Americanized Italians ; and nine out 

 of every ten visitors .select these two stocks as 

 perfectly pure. The fact is, the American bee- 

 keeping public will not, as a rule, accept a really 

 pure queen to breed from. I could relate some 

 curious facts about some of our American queen 

 breeders, but will not at present do so. For the 

 past two seasons I have rejected extra light 

 colored qiieens, and all queens thai produce 

 extra light colored, large, hairy drones, as 

 breeders ; and it is the first time in nine years 

 that I have met with any satisfactory results I 

 am now satisfied with the same colored queens, 

 drones, and workers, as we get direct from 

 Italy. I am also satisfied that the Italians can 

 be raised here, as well as in Italy. Why do they 

 not deteriorate, or turn back to the blacks, in 

 that country, if they are not now a tixed race? 



It is rather cuiious, and sometimes Liughable, 

 to read the statements of our queen breeders. 

 Some assert that only a very small portion of 

 queens raised are fit to breed from ; and yet they 

 do not give any reason why it is so. Now, it 

 certainly seems to me that if the queen is an im- 

 ported one, and all her tniccessors mate with 



pure drones, all ought to be fit to breed from, so 

 far as race is concerned. But if the jiosition I 

 have taken is correct— that is, that our queen 

 breeders will not breed from pure queens, but 

 rather from Americanized ones, as our friend 

 Dadant calls them, or mules, as our friend 

 Gardner denominates them, then there is noth- 

 ing strange in the alleged fact that a large pro- 

 portion of the queens raised show the black 

 blood, and that quite dismctly. The cross has 

 been so recent that there is no fixed type or 

 character t' ) the breed. But we must not attribute 

 all this to the breeder ; for in hundreds of cases 

 the customer is not satisfied with a pure Italian 

 queen. None other than an Americanized one 

 will suit their taste or fancy. I know of several 

 cases where pure queens have been returned or 

 rejected, and the ])arties have come to me with 

 their complaint ; and I have recommended the 

 complainant to apply to another bi-eeder, wlio 

 raises mules, and they were perfectly satisfied. 



[Fof the .\mericaa Bee Journal ] 



Eearing Queens. 



For the last four years I have been more less 

 extensively engaged in rearing Italian queens ; 

 and during that time have experimented some- 

 what with difterent methods- always aiming at 

 rearing fine large queens cheaply, and have 

 finally hit upon the following arrangement, 

 which is entirely satisfactory to me ; and I can 

 see no way that queens can be reared and fertil- 

 ized at less cost. 



I make small frame hives or nuclei of two 

 stories high, the upper story projecting o«t over 

 the lower, so as exclude the rain. The bottom 

 is nailed on to the lower story, while the upp.cr 

 has neitlur bottom nor top, being covered by a 

 plain board laid on, wuth a weight ui)on it to 

 keep it in jdace. Four small frames containing 

 combs are suspended in the usual way in the 

 lower story, with an entrance on one side, and a 

 feed trough on the opposite. Across the top of 

 the frames are laid four strips about one-fourth 

 of an inch square, and on these strips are placed 

 six cages two inches cubic, the four sides being 

 of wood (thin), the bottom wire cloth, and the 

 top glass, laid on with listing between, to i^revent 

 the escape of heat. A one-inch thick piece of 

 sponge one and a half inches long, is secured in 

 one corner, hanging downward. 



When it is time to commence operations, I 

 remove tlie queens from strong stocks, to get 

 queen cells. AVhen these are eight days old, I 

 get common bees from a distance, and give to 

 each nucleus hive a little more than a quart of 

 bees. Two days latter I remove my queen cel'^s 

 and give each nucleus in the lower story a sealt d 

 cell nearly ready to hatch. I then fill the si)ong( s 

 in the cages with honey, and into one corner of 

 each cage I attach a sealed queen cell by una s 

 of melted wax ; and then put in a lot of bees — 

 fifty or more, probably — to take care of the cell 

 and the young queen when she hatches. 



All being finished, the cages are set closely 

 together on the strips over the frames, wire cloth 

 side down — the six cages just covering the top of 



