1873.] 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



55 



"Wliat range these investigations, relative to 

 the glandular system of the bees first brought 

 to notice by Fischer, and through ignorance 

 neglected by the bee-keeper, will have, is 

 feadily seen not only in the preparation of the 

 food for the brood, but also in the honey gath- 

 ered and also in the working of the wax, which 

 the bees use in building their combs. Does 

 one consider that the brood bees take the wax 

 scales, sweated as it were from their body, and, 

 by chewing, reduce it to a pliable adhesive 

 condition, he will readily understand that 

 through this chewing and intermingling of the 

 secretions of the mouth, the wax will undergo 

 some change ; I am firmly of the belief that a 

 chemical analysis will show a difference in the 

 elements composing the wax scales and those 

 of the wax with which the combs are built ; 

 just such a difference as has been found to exist 

 between malt food and malt sugar. 



Huber. In regard to artificial honey, here- 

 tofore, I have not been able to comprehend how 

 the sweet juice could, in the honey-bag of the 

 bee, be changed into honey. Prof, Siebolt, 

 however, has made it clear to me, and I can now 

 believe that the change takes place partly in 

 the honey-bag of the bee, and partly in its 

 mouth. 



Heretofore, I was of the opinion that such a 

 change waa impossible, that honey was in 

 Nature alone — 'the distillation of the flower and 

 the plant. 



Dzierzon. Herr Huber thinks that the bees 

 suck in the honey from the flowers very quickly. 

 This is true, but the work of depositing it in 

 the combs is not so easily accomplished. It is 

 to be observed that the bees enter either with 

 the whole body, or with the head into the cell, 

 and that it takes them some time before they 

 are able to unload their burden. It is well 

 known that much of the honey, when it is first 

 brought home is very watery, and generally is 

 placed in the lower cells and afterwards removed 

 to the upper cells, and this I belive is done by 

 other bees; namely, the young bees, who use 

 the pollen and are more fitted for purifying the 

 honey. Under some circumstances, however, 

 the honey may remain unpurified, namely, when 

 there happens to be a rich honey dew, or when 

 the pine or fir trees sweat honey in abundance, 

 requiring all the force of the hive to gather it 

 in, and little pollen is brought, the bees have 

 not the time to attend to the purifying of the 

 honey. The mass of the honey, not having all 

 its nitrogen removed, may ferment and thus be 

 followed by injurious consequences to the bees, 

 producing dysentery, etc. 



These glands play a very weighty part in the 

 preparation of the food for the brood. Viewed 

 in this relation, no mention of them has been 

 heretofore made. 



Dr. Hummon, of Ingolstadt, replied to the 

 doubt thrown out by Herr Huber, as to the 

 rapidity with whicli the change was effected. 



He instanced the rapid change which takes 

 place in the food eaten by the human being. 

 That in almost a second of time the starch is 

 changed by the saliva into grape-sugar, and 

 this latter, almost before reaching the stomach, 

 is changed into another substance, so that the 

 time occupied in gathering the honey, carrying 

 it to the hive, and emptying it into the cells is 

 fully sufficient for the saliva of the bee to effect 

 most important changes. 



Dr. Heller says, some four years ago, I wanted 

 to examine what change sugar fed to bees, 

 underwent. I made the experiment in the fol- 

 lowing way: I colored some pure, dissolved 

 sugar, part with indigo and part with carmine. 

 On one day I gave the one kind, on the next 

 day the other to the bees for food. The fol- 

 lowing morning I found beautiful blue-colored 

 sugar-syrup in the cells, and, the morning after, 

 red-colored sugar-syrup in other cells. The 

 color was unchanged ; hence, I believe the food 

 had been unchanged. This, however, was only 

 a superficial judgment. Although this color 

 was unchanged, I soon became aware that the 

 bees were not satisfied w^th it. They took it 

 away and placed it in other cells. In a few 

 days I was unable to find either blue or red 

 honey — only a yellow-colored, which in nowise 

 differed from the ordinary honey. My experi- 

 ment, so far as it was intended to mark the 

 change of the sugar-food, miscarried. But my 

 knowledge was enriched, and with this knowl- 

 edge I hope to obtain a complete understanding 

 of that which I have heard to-day stated from 

 the mouth of this master of science. 



Dr. Pollraan thought it would be better 

 should the chemist use for experimental pur- 

 poses old, capped honey, rather than the new 

 and fresh honey. 



How can the weakening of stock, by too fre- 

 quent sivarining, he prevented f 



During the discussion of this question, Herr 

 Schelegiann made the following remarks: I 

 have invented a wire lattice, by means of which 

 the queen can be confined at the will of the 

 bee-keeper to one or more combs, and prevented 

 from laying too many eggs, so that the strength 

 of the stock will always remain about even. 

 In doing this, the bee-keeper must take into 

 account both the fertility of the queen and the 

 country in which his apiary is located. In a 

 situation where many bees are lost, when flying 

 out, the queen must have more comi) at her 

 disposal than where there is no danger of the 

 bees being lost. In speaking now, I refer to 

 my own neighborhood, Temesvarer-Cometats, 

 in Hungary, and here I confine three combs 

 (10x8 inches), for the queen to lay in, and find 

 them sufficient to maintain the standing of the 

 hive. The working bees can pass in and out 

 through the meshes of the wire gauze, but the 

 queen cannot ; if I place it over the three combs 

 in the centre of the hive, so that the combs and 



