30 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



Jan. 11, 1906 



ally a few bees are found that do not display the third 

 yellow ring, the one farthest from the thorax, until the 

 bee is full of honey. But the most positive sign of purity 

 is their adherence to the combs when properly handled 

 and their quietness under the same circumstances. 



A hive of bees, when handled properly, may be taken 

 entirely to pieces, and the combs may be carried about, 

 without either causing the bees to fly or to run about or 

 fall to the ground. In fact, Italian bees, if properly 

 handled, and pure, always show themselves as docile as 

 in a picture I saw lately, where were shown a couple 

 dozen visitors each holding a comb covered with bees. 

 In the exhibit they call these bees the "red-clover strain." 

 but they are simply showing the characteristics of the pure 

 Italian bees, which might all be appropriately called "red- 

 clover" bees, for they often work on the second crop of 

 red clover, probably when the dry weather causes the 

 corolla to have become somewhat shorter than usual. 



There are times when the common bee can work on 

 red-clover also, but these occurrences are very rare. There 

 is a desire on the part of queen-breeders to secure, by 

 selection, a race of bees that may be able to gather honey 

 from red clover; that is, a race with. tongues long enough 

 to reach to the bottom of the red clover corolla at all 

 times. This desire is commendable, and is in the line of 

 progress, but it will take a long time to get a fixed race 

 with longer tongues, and thus far the selections have 

 faded to secure anything permanent. The pure Italian 

 bees can and do work on red clover oftener than the com- 

 mon bee, which shows that their tongue is longer than 

 that of the common bee, and a constant selection for this 

 purpose wdl sooner or later bring the desired result. ■ 



On the question of greater productiveness in a com- 

 parison between the common bee and the Italian, there 

 has been a division of opinions, some people holding that 

 the common bee does produce as much honey. -Yet the 

 majority of opinions is in favor of the Italians." The facts 

 are that the difference between the two races is accentu- 

 ated by bad seasons. The Italian race is more saving than 

 the black, and in a poor season the bees of an Italian 

 colony may have a good supply of honey saved up for 

 winter, while the black colonies will be almost destitute 

 This was evidenced to us most forcibly early in the seven- 

 ties. We had purchased a dozen colonies of bees in box- 

 hives. Y\ e transferred all these bees in May to movable 

 frames Seven of the colonies were exceedingly strong 

 while the other 5 were comparatively weak and under 

 average. \\ e concluded to Italianize the weak ones be- 

 cause they would not produce honey anyhow, and they 

 could _still recuperate and be good for winter. But the 

 other /which had very fertile queens, we decided to leave 

 until tall, for we disliked to destroy those queens at the 

 opening of the crop. Queens were high in price at that 

 time, and our method of Italianizing was by the introduc- 

 tion of queen-eel s from a pure colony, which always re- 

 tarded the growth of the colony thus Italianized. 

 , ,, s °we left the 7 colonies with their black queens till 



hlli Jl S f e S Ult xP f th tf \ eaSOn was bad - Ma "y colonies 

 had to be fed. But the S colonies which had been Ital- 



ianized early gathered enough to winter, while the 7 pow- 



Th;= ""A? . W .l th b ' ack qUe , enS had to be fed for winter. 

 Ihis settled the question of comparison between the races 



with us. Since that time we have often noticed the same 



„' ng_ "w g *f ater u Pr ° pensity to economy in the Italian 

 race. We then began rearing Italian bees, and tried the 

 importation until we succeeded, and, to-day, I stronodv 

 recommend to the beginners to breed from the ItaHaii 

 race. 



There are other races of bees that have claimed the 

 attention of bee-keepers— the Carniolan. which is onlv a 

 very slight variation of the common bee; the Cvprian a 

 very active and high-tempered bee; and the Caucasian 

 None of these races has given a uniformity of results 

 sufficient to recommend it, and the mild temper of the 

 Italian is sufficient to give it the supremacy over all 

 others. Besides, its markings (the yellow bands) enable 

 bee-keepers to ascertain its purity, and for that reason I 

 believe that I am right in recommending this bee to the 

 beginner in apiculture. 



I ascribe a part, at least, of our success to the use of 

 Italian bees. In many spots the Italians are almost the 

 only race existing— in Colorado, for instance. I visited 

 many apiaries in Colorado and saw no bees there but the 

 Italian I believe this is a strong point in the success of 

 Colorado bee-culture. Hamilton, 111. 



Italians vs. Black Bees 



BY E. W. DIEFENDORF. 



ON page 775 is an article by Allen Latham that greatly 

 interested me. In the earlier days of our journalistic 

 literature there was much battling over the respective 

 merits and defects of the Italian-black bees, but the black 

 went under, even though championed by such men as 

 Lucas, Heddon, and Brown. After keeping the two side 

 by side since early in the '60's, I finally discarded them 

 about the year 1881. My experience that year was de- 

 cisive. I entered that season with 25 straight Italians 

 and 95 blacks and mongrels, and both races worked alike 

 and for comb honey. By Sept. 1 the blacks and hybrids 

 were all gone by dwindling, desertion, or death, except 

 one colony, while the Italians were all populous and in 

 prime condition except that some were too light to winter. 

 I am not just certain of the date, but it was when A. I. 

 Root was recommending grape-sugar as a bee-food, and 

 I tried it that fall to my sorrow. 



My experience has not been that "Italians run so 

 easily to the black condition"' — indeed, it seems to me 

 after establishing these bees in four locations, widely apart 

 and surrounded by nothing but blacks, that they scattered 

 their yellow much faster than they took on the black. 

 This has a bearing on that rapid-flight theory. In the 

 case of Allen Latham's queens, there may have been a 

 factor other than swiftness that caused two-thirds of his 

 queens to mismate. 



Many years ago the elder Muth explained the suc- 

 cessful mating of his queens in his house-top apiary in 

 Cincinnati, by assuming that the wing-tone of both queens 

 and drones was on a different pitch in the two races, and 

 stated in the same article that Italian worker-bees main- 

 tained their flight in the strong winds of that high situa- 

 tion more easily than the blacks. He was a very close 

 observer. 



In my own experience, queens of the lemon-banded 

 strains (not goldens) are almost always purely mated, 

 while of the orange-banded strains often from 3 to 5 

 percent are mismated, and it is a fact that the latter are 

 the largest and coarser both in wing and body. 



Again, if I breed from a colony a part of whose 

 workers show but two bands, I expect about 50 percent 

 to mismate. They still more nearly approach the black 

 in wing-tone. 



I do not remember that anyone has mentioned two 

 traits peculiar to the blacks, that are of great practical 

 value. They readily adopt any young queen just hatched 

 (slipped quickly into the entrance), and allow her to kill 

 the old queen at any time, provided a honey-flow is on. 

 And when well-shaded, well-ventilated, with abundant 

 super-room easily accessible, they are non-swarmers. 



New Lebanon, Mo. 



Report for the Season of 1905 



BY WM. STOLLEY, SR. 



THE year is nearing its end, and here is my report for 

 the season of 1905, now passed. Four years in suc- 

 cession we have had wet seasons, but the summer of 

 1905 is on record with about 40 inches of rainfall within 

 6 months. While in times passed long ago drouth was 

 the greatest drawback in central Nebraska, excessive mois- 

 ture during the growing season seems to have taken its 

 place. 



For the apiarist the year of 1905 stands out as the 

 worst in the last 26 years, with us — i. c, as long as bees 

 have been kept here. In the spring, and up to June 23. I 

 fed my 36 colonies of bees 390 pounds of fall honey, and 

 at that time they were in the best possible condition to 

 take advantage of a copious honey-flow. Everything pre- 

 sented a favorable outlook. 



From June 9 to the 13th I had 3 swarms out of New 

 Heddon hives, but from the 3 colonies in my own large 

 14-frame (ll^Sxll^) hives, run for extracted honey, no 

 swarms issued, although each and every colony was, dur- 

 ing the entire season, exceedingly strong in bees. 



In the "decoy hives" on top of my bee-shed I captured 

 6 runaway hunger swarms, from some farmers keeping a 

 few colonies of bees — all hybrids. 



All the surplus I took out of the supers was 640 pounds 

 of extracted honey, leaving some colonies entirely without 



