214 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



[March, 



ner, and soon died. An honr before sunset, I 

 opened the hive for examination, when I found 

 all the bees engaged in fighting. They were 

 nearly all clinched together in a perfect net. 1 

 blew a little smoke among them without much 

 effect. I took the frames apart and found some 

 balls of bees the size of a hen's eg<^, on the bot- 

 tom of the hive. I then looked for the queen, 

 and found her at the back end of the comb, un- 

 hurt, suiTOunded by a few working bees not en- 

 gaged in lighting. I closed the hive again, and 

 next morning re-opened it, and found that peace 

 had been restored, but hundreds of bet-s were 

 killed, though the queen still remained un- 

 harmed. 



I account for the occurrence in this way: One 

 portion of the workers was for killing the queen, 

 while another portion a party was opposed to it, 

 and they settled the controversy by war, the 

 right jirevailing in the end. I must say that I 

 never saw the like before, nor heard of it in the 

 history of the honey bee. The nucleus con- 

 sisted of half a swarm of bees. 



I see in the Journal that Mr. John M. Price 

 condemns all artificial queen raising. He says, 

 having failed with the theory of all other au- 

 thors, he got up a new plan to get large and pro 

 lific quteens, by giving the bees the swarming 

 fever some way. Now I wish to ask Mr. Price 

 what he would call such queen cells and queens 

 raised in a hive where the bees swarmed out in 

 the swarming season, without previously start- 

 ing queen cells, leaving the bees remaining in 

 the hive to construct queen cells afterwai'ds '? 

 The question is whether such queen and queen 

 cells were natural or non-natural '? I had two 

 swarms swarm out, when no queen cells were 

 started. 



I have raised queens since the year 18GG, for 

 my own vise. I never started a nucleus yet, that 

 did not raise its queen. I have lost some queens 

 when they left the hive to meet a drone. I have 

 followed Mr. Langstroth's and Mr. Dzierzon's 

 directions for raising artificial queens ; hence I 

 think I understand their theory. I have queens 

 that were raised in June, 1S07, and were alive 

 yet last fall, which would make them three 

 yeais old last June. They are very large and 

 handsome, and were raised from a Langstroth 

 queen, for which I paid twenty dollars. Hence 

 I shall keep them as long as they live. 



Mr. Price says, in reply to Mr. Dadant, that a 

 queen hatched from a grub three or four days 

 old, would do to sell, liere, I think, Mr. Price 

 is laboring under a mistake, as I have raised 

 queens from grubs of the bees, choosing those that 

 were six days old, so that the queens hatched on 

 the tenth day, and they were very large and pro- 

 lific. Dzierzon, the great German apiarian, 

 says it makes no difference whether the bees 

 choose an egg or a grub three or four days old. 

 All the difference is, that if they choose the 

 grub, the queens will hatch so many days 

 sooner. I confirm that statement, swarming 

 fever or no swarming fever. I have no artifi- 

 cial queens for sale. 



H. EOSENSTIEL. 



Lena, Ills., Feb. G, 1871. 



[For tlie American Bee Journal.] 



Explanatory Jottings. 



Mr. Editor : — Allow us now to hit Novice a 

 trifle, just to see what effect it will have. 

 When we commenced to write for the A merican 

 Bee Journal, we made the proposition to answer 

 all inquiries, if the inquirers would simply en- 

 close a stamp to prepay postage. We might 

 answer those inquiries by simply saying Yes or 

 No, to each. But our object was to give instruc- 

 tion, and such short answer would not benefit 

 the querist. Therefore we choose to give the 

 w'hy and wherefore ; and Novice will readily see 

 that for a hard working farmer, this must neces- 

 sarily take up much of his time, for which we 

 receive nothing but the thanks of our correspon- 

 dents, and the consciousness on our part of 

 indeavoring to assist our fellow beings. (Here 

 I will thank those inquirers who are ready and 

 willing to pay for information, and have amply 

 paid, &c. ) We have been accused of doing this 

 for notoriety. But, if we have become notorious, 

 it was the very furthest thing from our intention 

 when we commenced ; therefore we do not con- 

 sider ourselves as at all to blame. Our conscience 

 is entirely clear cm that head. If we write for 

 other papers, it is with the assurance that we 

 would only promise to do so during the long 

 winter evenings, and only one article .should be 

 used in each number, if it was expected to make 

 them hold out, &c. We do not remember giving 

 any such instructions to the editor of the Jour- 

 nal, and lience he sometimes puts them in, in 

 greater numbers, as long as they last, and then 

 the stream runs dry. Thereupon we received 

 private letters by the score, berating us for not 

 writing more for the A. B. J. (Wonder whether 

 they would be satisfied, providing we should 

 devote our entire time, and occupy one-half of 

 every ninnber with our nonsense ?j But we 

 have a family to provide for and are not over- 

 burdened witli greenbacks ; consequently we 

 could hardly devote more time to them, if we 

 would. Now Mr. Novice, didn't you pile it on 

 rather thick, when you said tliat we write "nary 

 word for the old stand-by"? We think the 

 February number shows that we have not for- 

 gotten "the old stand-by," by a long chalk. 



On page 180, we should read "Even the 

 crossest hybrids could be handled with impu- 

 nity, without the use of smoke," instead oi with 

 the use of smoke. On page 192, article headed 

 "Hives," &c., third line read "That were 

 worthless," instead of "they w^ere worthless." 

 Take away or strip them all of the Lang.stroth 

 features, and what would they look like ? Echo 

 answers — "wiiat would they look like." 



On the third and fourth of February, my two 

 stocks that are on their summer stands, had a 

 good fiy. Those in the Diamond hive are winter- 

 ing nicely, but something else is wanted in a 

 hive, besides the wintering qualities. Those in 

 the Alley hive are not wintering well. Others 

 make the same complaint. I started on the 

 sixth for Cincinnati. It is now snowing heavily 

 from the north-east. E. Gallup. 



Orchard, Iowa. 



