332 



THE AMERICAN BEE KEEPER. 



August 



PURE DRONES FROM 3IISMATED QUEEN. 



A mismated queen will produce 

 pure drones, as to the mother's stock. 

 Imagination. Truth: Italian queens 

 mated to black drones will produce 

 some black drones, which is sufficient 

 proof that they too get some of the 

 black blood of the father. 



HARD TO CHANGE OLD IDEAS. 



If men would write their experience 

 instead of what they imagine, and the 

 knowledge they glean from the read- 

 ing of books, the errors of our fathers 

 would soon be corrected. Whea ideas 

 are once stampt on a man's brains it 

 is a very difficult matter to get him to 

 even consider anything contradictory 

 to them. To illustrate: When I was 

 a boy my oldest brother and I went 

 hunting. He carried the gun, and 

 about a mile from home we saw two 

 deer. Brother shot and killed them 

 both, I was very anxious to kill a 

 deer, but never succeeded. I began 

 to persuade brother to let us tell the 

 folks at home that I killed one and he 

 killed the other. Agreed. So the lie 

 was manufactured and put into oper- 

 ation. I received more praise than he 

 did, because I was the least. From 

 year to year we would tell this; the 

 idea was finally stampt on my brain, 

 that I did kill the deer, and was ready 

 to kick like a bay steer when brother 

 said that I did not. 



Should one of those gentlemen who 

 made the errors jueutioued above, 

 chance to pick this article up, and be- 

 gin to read, he would drop it like a 

 hot rock, l)ecause it cunflicis wiih ihe 

 ideas he has advanced or contracted 

 from reading books which were written 

 by men when modem bee-keeping was 

 in its infancy, and before many of the 

 secrets of the bee hive were rtvealtd 



to the human mind. Oh, if we could 

 only be content to write what we knew 

 to be actual facts, instead of poisoning 

 the minds of the seekers after knowl- 

 edge with our imaginations, we would 

 be a blessing instead of a curse to 

 humanity. There is no pursuit about 

 which people are so ignorant as that 

 of bee-keeping, and most people can 

 recollect things told them about any- 

 thing else better than things told them 

 about bees. 



There is an old gentlemen with 

 whom I am well acquainted, who be- 

 gan studying bee-keeping. He pro- 

 cured some of the best books on the 

 subject. I heard him tell a lot of 

 clabber-headed fellows one day that 

 he learned from one of the books that 

 queens were often reared from larvie 

 three days old. I told the old fellow 

 the book he got that out of was just 

 guessing at it. He insisted that the 

 man who wrote the book knew what 

 he was talking about. I begged the 

 old man to let me prove to him that a 

 queen could not be reared from a larvse 

 three days old. "Oh," said he, "it 

 could be done." I offered $10 for 

 every queen he could rear from a 

 larvte three days old. He began to 

 experiment a little, and finally he 

 agreed that it could not be done. 



Some bee-writers say that good 

 queens cannot be reared from larvse 

 three days old. I say, and will prove 

 to any sensible man, that no kind of 

 a queen can be reared from a larvse 

 so old. And I believe thiit G. M. 

 Doolittle and Henry Alley will bear 

 me out in it. 



I love the bee-books and bee-papers; 

 I take and read them all. I love the 

 good men who write them, but the un- 

 vainisht truth is dearer to me than 

 theiu all. 



Milam Co., Texas. 



