220 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



[For Our American Bee Journal. 



Facts for Bee Men. 



In the Report of the Commissioner of Agri- 

 culture for the year 1863, page 539, R. Colvin 

 says : — "It should never be lost sight of that, 

 although the drone progeny of a queen reared 

 from a pure Italian egg, but impregnated by an 

 impure or even nntive drone, may be pwre Ital- 

 ian, (which is now considered by Europeans, 

 as well as many American breeders, as an es- 

 tablished fact)." Now, I do not agree with R. 

 Colvin, L. L. Langstroth, and others, that a 

 queen thus impregnated, can produce any pure 

 progeny, either male or female. I tried that 

 process several years ago, until I was satisfied 

 they did not produce pure progeny. 



Nor do I believe in the doctrine that the size 

 of the cells has anything to do with the fecun- 

 dation of the eggs, by pressure. As the queen 

 backs into the the cells, to deposit her eggs, I 

 have frequently seen her depositing eggs in 

 cells just commenced ; eggs sticking out as far 

 as the edge of the cells. There can be no pres- 

 sure of her abdomen at all. Those eggs thus 

 laid in worker cells, invariably hatch workers. 



I would advise all who wish to keep their 

 bees pure, not to breed from drones whose 

 mother is impurely fertilized. 



Bees can be improved by careful breeding, as 

 well as any other stock. "Whilst at Kelley's 

 Island, raising queens in 1866, I commenced by 

 picking out of the first lot of queens hatched, 

 one queen. She was very large and light-color- 

 ed. After she had deposited eggs six days, I 

 removed her and let her bees construct queen 

 cells from her eggs. When they were capped 

 over, I cut them out and inserted them in nu- 

 clei. When they hatched, I picked out the lar- 

 gest and lightest-colored again, and so on until 

 I had raised the eighth generation that year. 

 In 1867, I raised five generations, and in 1868, 

 rive more — making eighteen generations in 

 three years. 



Most of the queens thus raised I put in my 

 own hives at home and others in the vicinity ; 

 so that I could test them and pick out the best 

 each year to breed from. By careful breeding 

 I have succeeded in producing very large and 

 light- colored bees. When we take the same 

 pains in breeding our bees, that the Vcrmonter 

 does in breeding his sheep, we will find that we 

 can put yellow bands on them, as easily as he 

 can put wrinkles on his sheep. I am in for im- 

 provement. 



Small bees are more apt to sting than large 

 ones. 



Aaron Benedict. 



Bennington, Ohio. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



Reply to Mr. J. H. Thomas on the 

 Purity of the Queen. 



A large swarm of bees may weigh seven 

 pound?, and others gradually less, to one pound, 

 Consequently, a very good swarm may weight 

 five or six pounds. All such as weigh less than 

 four pounds, should be strengthened, by uni- 

 ting to them a less numerous swarm. — Wild- 

 man. 



In contradiction of the theory of Mr. J. H. 

 Thomas, as given in the March number of 

 the Bee Journal, and which seems to mean 

 that all queens whose workers have three rincs, 

 have mated with pure drones ; I maintain, as I 

 have already stated in the September number of 

 the Journal, that color alone is not sufficient to 

 establish the purity of the queens ; but that the 

 slender form, the tapering abdomen, and the 

 I thick greyish hairs around the abdomen are ne- 

 cessary also. 



No doubt friend Thomas has only purely im- 

 pregnated queens in his apiary ; at least he 

 thinks so. But there are in his vicinity some 

 careless bee-keepers ; let us suppose that one 

 of his pure drones mates with a black queen ; 

 the progeny will be half-breed. If that half- 

 breed progeny mate with a pure drone, the 

 daughters will be three-fourths Italian, and so 

 on. Then let one of these three-fourth Italian 

 drones mate with one of his pure Italian queens; 

 does friend Thomas have eyes keen enough to 

 detect the change, if he relies only on color ? 

 His three-banded seven-eighths Italian bees will 

 no longer be pure in the full meaning of the 

 word. 



The first importers of Italian queens commit- 

 ted a serious mistake, in importing German 

 bred queens, and in looking only at the color. 

 For, notwithstanding their golden hue, so much 

 loved in Germany and so loudly extolled here, 

 I claim that most of the German bred queens, 

 used as breeding stock, are more or less tainted 

 with Mack blood, because in shape the workers 

 are not all alike in all the hives, and their form 

 is very diiferent from that of Italian imported 

 bees. 



Furthermore, the best queen breeders in Italy, 

 | living at the foot of the inaccessible Alps, can- 

 not meet the light color so fashionable in Ger- 

 many. Their endeavors in this direction are 

 always frustrated by the drones of their neigh- 

 bors, and their bees invariably revert to the 

 typical color, such as was known and sung by 

 Virgil two thousand years ago. 



Ch. Dadakt. 



Hamilton, Ills. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



The Bee Disease. 



I have noticed, in emptying the hives in 

 which my bees died last fall, that the honey in 

 the lower uncapped cells was very thin and 

 watery. My bees also obtained honey from a 

 so-called honey dew last summer. But bees 

 north of me did the same, and have not died. 

 Can this disease be connected with the fact that 

 Hie bees cast no swarms during the season V 

 C. E. TnoRNE. 



Selma, Ohio. 



