688 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Uueens iDjnrel In SMpplng. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 



BY G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



I see by the bee-papers that Mrs. Jen- 

 nie Atchley has been using some pretty 

 strong terms, and giving some very elu- 

 sive evidence (according to her oivn 

 mind), that queens are not injured when 

 taken from the hives in which they are 

 having full sway as mothers, and con- 

 signed to the gentle(?) treatment of the 

 mail-bags. I also note this language 

 from another queen-breeder : 



" No, the confinement of a queen dur- 

 ing shipment rarely if ever affects her 

 fertility. We can speak positively when 

 we say that shipment either by mail or 

 express does not deteriorate the laying 

 qualities of a queen." 



Now, I suppose, as a breeder of 

 queens, if I would consult my own in- 

 terests, I should let this pass unchal- 

 lenged ; but I feel that my duty and 

 truth require me to protest from such a 

 decision, when the facts along the line 

 of injury to queens in shipment are so 

 plainly to be seen, as I and others have 

 often seen them. 



Probably no man in the United States 

 has any more flattering testimonials, ac- 

 cording to the number of queens ship- 

 ped than 1 have ; yet this does not prove 

 that some of the queens I have sent out 

 have never been injured by shipment. 

 By shipment, I include all the necessary 

 evils attending the removal of a queen 

 from her hive and home, and sending 

 her to another hive and home where she 

 is obliged to suddenly stop a profuse 

 egg-laying, and continue in this condi- 

 tion for from three days to three weeks. 



If I am not mistaken, it was James 

 Heddon who first called attention to 

 this injury, attributing it at the time to 

 the rough usage the queen received in 

 the mails, saying that under no circum- 

 stances, and for no consideration, would 

 he have a valuable queen seni in any 

 way but by express. When I read this. 



which was many years ago, I said, this 

 accounts for the unsatisfactory re- 

 sults I have often obtained from queens 

 which I have purchased that were sent 

 by mail ; so for some time after that I 

 ordered all of the choice queens which 

 I purchased, sent by express. However, 

 as I saw little difference in favor of 

 those which came by express over those 

 which came by mail, I concluded that I 

 must look elsewhere for the trouble. 



In looking over the past to see where 

 the difficulty lay, I saw that such a 

 queen, sent me by a noted breeder as a 

 premium for getting the most subscrib- 

 ers to a certain bee-paper, had not laid 

 eggs enough during a year to amount to 

 as much as one of my ordinary queens 

 would lay in six weeks, so I wrote him 

 asking if he remembered whether the 

 queen was prolific with him or not. His 

 reply was that she was unusually so, 

 and at the time he took her out of the 

 hive, she was keeping ten Langstroth 

 frames full of brood. 



Later on I received another queen 

 from another noted breeder, for which I 

 paid $12, thinking to get the best there 

 was in the country, but while she lived 

 she was about the poorest layer I ever 

 had, yet I was assured that she came 

 near perfection as to prolificness before 

 she was sent me. 



Soon after this I commenced to send 

 out queens myself, and during my ex- 

 perience as a breeder and shipper of 

 queens, some five or six instances have 

 come under my notice, of queens which 

 proved of no special value as to prolific- 

 ness after they were received by the 

 purchasing party, while I know they 

 were among the best, if not the best, 

 queens as to prolificness I ever had in 

 my yard. 



While studying on these things, and 

 looking for a cause, my eye chanced to 

 rest on a few sentences regarding the 

 shipping of queens, by either Mr. Hutch- 

 inson or Mr. Hayhurst, if I mistake not, 

 in which it was said that the removing 

 of a queen from a full colony during the 

 height of her egg-laying, and immedi- 

 ately sending her off, caused her to be 

 unprolific ever afterward, and that to 

 remedy this, they caged such a day or 

 so before they sent them off, which al- 

 lowed them to rid themselves of their 

 eggs (something as a queen does before 

 issuing with a natural swarm) before 

 they were subject to the rough usage 

 they must be subjected to in the mails. 

 I may not have quoted this just right, 

 but have given the impression it left on 

 my mind at that time. 

 Soon after this I saw where another 



