THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 211 



I have the supers at my left and as fast as I put in the founda- 

 tion I set them in place in the super and when I get through the 

 job is complete. 



]\Iany will think it a waste of foundation to put in full sheets 

 and bottom starts as I do, but I have tested it out pretty thoroughly 

 the last few years and I find it pays me. It's not only that I get 

 more hone}-, but I get so much more fancy honey. 



Barrvton, ^lich. 



Improvement of the Bee. 



E. S. MILES. 



^^^ HiE above topic is one of the most important now confronting 

 \Jj the bee-keeping fraternity in my humble opinion. Since I 

 am an old personal acquaintance of Dr. Bonney, I hope he 

 will pardon my reference to him. I will say for the enlightenment 

 of the readers of the Review, that I lived for a long term of years 

 only about five miles from the doctor, and now" live about twenty- 

 five miles from him. 



I am glad to see that the doctor has modified his views some- 

 what of late on this important question. A year or two ago he 

 seemed quite certain that "bees were a highly specialized animal, 

 and had about reached the limit of their development." 



It is gratifying to find out that our great college professors do 

 not deny us common, ignorant chaps, the hope of a little ''modifica- 

 tion" of the bee. 



Had the doctor's replies been otherwise than our own, (as we 

 supposed) authorities on bees such as Doolittle, Miller, Hutchinson 

 and Alexander, they would have found some of their laurels but 

 willow branches after all, for they all teach that bees respond readily 

 to careful selective breeding. 



A I.ITTI.I: FERSONAI. EXFISBIENCi:. 



Pardon a little personal experience, which I admit in advance 

 has made me a little indifferent to opinions of learned theorists. 

 Fourteen years ago I began breeding from a queen whose bees 

 showed a greater variation in the direction of the qualities I wanted 

 in bees of anything I had seen till that time. From that one colony, 

 surrounded ever since with a lot of common bees, bred on good old 

 Nature's own let alone plan, I have built up by selective breeding a 

 couple of hundred colonies of bees that, for suret}- of crop, for 

 hardiness and ability to take care of themselves, and for non- 

 swarming qualities, are at least .50% better "than anything I have 

 seen thus far in my bee-keeping experience. 



