1 ^Y 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



to make any gains. Man has produced breeds of horses, cows, pigs, 

 dogs and birds which breed true to type, but we cannot say as much 

 about the bees, especially when it conies to that prime essential, 

 "hustle." Is it due to parthenogenesis, or is it because the bees are 

 wild by nature? Shall we find that Mendelism is a factor of study? 

 Is Mother Nature, regardless of man's efforts, slowly and surely 

 developing an American Bee, just as in the ages past she has giveri 

 us the Italian ? To save room for something more important than 

 what I think — for I believe but little — I here offer the correspond- 

 ence between myself and men very prominent in their fields: — 



Professor W. M. Wheeler, Sept. 11, 1911. 



Boston, Mass. 

 Dear Sir: — 



I wrote Prof. MacDougal, of the Carnegie Institution, who is, as 

 you probably know, in charge of the Desert Laboratory, asking for 

 information as to what we may expect to gain in the family Apis 

 by selection and breeding. He replied : "* * * * ''^ I shrink from 

 attempting to answer your question off-hand," and refers me to you. 



In the bee journals of late have been many heavy (?) and learned 

 disquisitions a non-swarming, a long-tongued, and, laterly, an im- 

 proved strain of bees, basing claims almost entirely on the fact that 

 we have been able to add a couple of yellow rings to the original 

 three on the abdomen of the Italian bee. Even an authority like 

 Prof. E. F. Phillips, of the Department of Apiculture, Washington, 

 says, p. 1.1:5, Bee-Keepers' Review, May, 1911, "When we see what 

 has been done in breeding five-banded Italians we are forced to the 

 conclusion that it is possible to change the bee by breeding. If we 

 could but devise a method for control of mating, progress would be 

 more rapid. The five-banded bee did not exist in the days of Sam- 

 son's exploit with the Leo bar-frame hive, and it is probable that 

 before as many centuries pass again some further changes in the 

 bee may be seen." 



I am ordering a copy of this issue of the Review sent to you, 

 that you may see the article from which this is copied. 



I have always been of the opinion that the bee is the most highly 

 specialized animal alive, and that all progress, change or improve- 

 ment ceased ages ago. If I am wrong in this, I wish to try to de- 

 velop a strain or breed of bees which will be good honey gatherers, 

 reasonably gentle, and hardy in this climate, but so long as it is 

 not convenient to control male parentage (though in the Dakotas, 

 where I lately spent some time, there are millions of acres which 

 never saw a bee, treeless, flowerless plains where mating can be 

 controled perfectly, I think), and a generation of worker bees is 

 but forty (40) days, of a queen three or four years and a drone two 

 or three months how may we begin? We bee keepers have been 



