Jin. 17, 1907 



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AmeriCcin Hee Journal i 



Drones' Flight— Building 

 Drone-Cells 



BY DR. C. C. MILLER. 



When a man puts up as good a fight 

 as does the Afterthinker on page 950 

 (1906), it's hartt for me to repress a 

 ^feeling of sympathy, and certainly there 

 is more or less an inclination to capitu- 

 late to the enemy. But, as the enemy 

 says, "cause a pretty important one," 

 and I musn't weakly give way to sen- 

 timent. So here's at you again, O mine 

 enemy, the Afterthinker ! 



"Neither swiftness nor numbers avail ; 

 and the queen does not lead off with 

 any great swiftness." I think that state- ' 

 ment has the merit of originality. So 

 far as I remember, others have held the 

 opposite view. But if you know you're 

 right and they are wrong, Mr. Hasty, 

 your word goes a long ways with me. 

 Only I'd kind of like to know how you 

 know. 



"The drone that wins is tlie one that 

 gets ready first." That's a new one, too. 

 Not so very unlikel}', though ; for the one 

 that's first ready is likely to start first. 

 Let us accept, then, that speed doesn't 

 count, nor numbers ; only being ready 

 first. Remains for you to satisfy the 

 court, Mr. Hasty, that an only son will 

 be ready sooner than any one of a 

 large family of brothers. " Among 

 plains-cattle the bull that can conquer 

 in fight wins." Sure ; but then you know 

 that if that same bull be stall-fed he'll 

 not conquer in fight. Doesn't pamper- 

 ing tend to loginess rather than prompt- 

 ness in readiness? 



Without stopping to inquire how the 

 answer might affect either or both sides, 

 it might not be irrelevant right here to 

 inquire whether in reality there is any 

 shortage of rations on account of the 

 large number of male members in the 

 family; in other words, at the time when 

 drones are likely to be in demand, have 

 you any proof, Mr. Hasty, that there is 

 not ready for each and every drone all 

 and more than he is willing to eat? 



"Now, Dr. Miller and his nice little 

 square of comb," etc. Who said any- 

 thing about "square" of comb? Did you 

 never hear of patching comb by cut- 

 ting out circular pieces with a cake-cut- 

 ter ? Pray, where, in that case, would 

 be your corners for j-our drone-cells, 

 Mr. Hasty? But I'll be on the square, 

 and admit that I've put in more square 

 than round patches ; indeed, I've put in 

 a big lot of the square ones. Then you 

 ask: "How on earth is he going to pre- 

 vent one drone-cell on each corner of 

 his sliced work?" and before I have time 

 to gather breath to tell how 'to prevent 

 it, you run right on with 4 drone-cells 



on each side and gel a Gideon's band of 

 320 in a yard. Cool of you, isn't it? 

 What made you stop with the corners? 

 Why didn't you, while you were at it, 

 juiit as well assume that there would be 

 a whole row of drone-cells clear around 

 the patch ? 



Before I answer your question as to 

 prevention, suppose I ask you a few 

 questions : Did you ever put in a square 

 patch of worker-comb in place of drone- 

 comb? And did the bees decorate the 

 corners with 8 drone-cells? Were there 

 4? Did you ever see one? Did you 

 ever hear of one? 



While the stenographer is taking down 

 your answer to those questions, I'll an- 

 swer your question as to what I did to 

 prevent drone-cells when patching. I 

 never did anything. I just put in the 

 patches, and the bees did the rest. And 

 although I put in lots of patches, I do 

 not rememljer to have seen one single 

 drone-cell as corner-work. And I feel 

 pretty sure that if there had been one I 

 should have noticed it; and just as sure 

 that I would have remembered it. A 

 sealed drone-cell among worker-cells is 

 somewhat conspicuous. Now, it would 

 be just like you to ask why the bees 

 didn't build any drone-cells in those cor- 

 ners ; but I'm not obliged to answer that 

 question. Maybe they didn't have room ; 

 maybe they're not in the habit of putting 

 in a single odd cell; I don't know; the 

 important thing is that they don't — at 

 least not "in this locality." 



You say, Mr. Hasty : "Slicing patches 

 of drone-cells is not very difficult; but 

 getting all the scattered single ones is 

 desperately difficult * * * *. The work 

 is disagreeable as well as long." That 

 makes me wish very much I could look 

 through some of your hives : I'm sure 

 you'd allow me for that length of time 

 if I came under a flag of truce. For it 

 would be something in the line of a 

 curiosity for me to see single drone-cells 

 scattered about through a hive. I can 

 stretch my imagination far enough to 

 suppose that a colony with a mania for 

 producing drones, if it had all its combs 

 filled with worker-bees, might, in its 

 desperation, try to get a cell or two 

 wherever there was a chance ; but I 

 never yet saw a case in which there 

 was any such scattering. You know 

 that G. M. Doolittle advises an inch or 

 two square of drone-comb left in one 

 comb, saying, if I remember rightly, that 

 that will satisfy the bees so they will 

 build no Tnoro. And then if you come 

 and look through my hives — I'll let you 

 come without the flag of truce — I'll show 

 you comb after comb, nearly all of my 

 combs, where \ou'll not find a cell, even 

 with your "specs" on. But some combs 

 have patches in spite of me : holes have 

 in some way got in, and have been filled 



with drone-comb, and I've beentoonegli- 

 V,' lit to patch them. Hut a patch or two 

 111 I aoh hive is all you're likely to find, 

 with none in the other combs. 



I've turned somersaults in my life- 

 time before this, and it is among the 

 possibilities that the time may come 

 when instead of discouraging drones of 

 poor stock I shall believe in allowing a 

 lot of drones in all but best colonies, 

 and limiting the number in the best; but 

 I'll wait to hear from you again, Mr. 

 Hasty, before embracing that doctrine. 



Fumigating Foul-Broody 

 Combs with Formal- 

 dehyde 



By DAVID J. WEST. 



On page 884 (1906), the question was 

 asked, "Has fumigation of brood-combs 

 exposed in a tight room ever been tried 

 on foul-broody combs with formalde- 

 hyde?" One answer was "Yes, and as 

 a rule not successful." Another answer 

 was, "It will never be a success in an 

 apiary." We have used formaldehyde 

 on foul-broody combs with good suc- 

 cess, and have cured many sets of combs 

 of the disease, and, without doubt, now 

 have a hundred colonies on combs that 

 were once affected with foul or black 

 brood. 



We have several ways of treating foul 

 brood, but when we wish to use tiie 

 combs again, we shake the bees into a 

 clean hive on starters for 3 to 5 days, 

 then take out the starters and put in 

 foundation, which will usually free the 

 bees of the disease. 



To free the combs of the disease, we 

 stack them 3 or 4 hives high, on a col- 

 ony that is slightly diseased — so as not to 

 carry the disease farther — with a queen- 

 excluder on to keep the queen- in her 

 own hive, and use the combs that sea- 

 son for extracting combs. This saves 

 the good brood, and makes a strong col- 

 ony, which will clean the combs of the 

 bad brood and fill them with honey. 

 The combs are extracted as often as 

 needed, and, after the harvest are left 

 to be cleaned out by the bees. 



Then we place the combs in an air- 

 tight box, which holds about 100 combs, 

 and fumigate them from 20 to 40 min- 

 utes with water and formaldehyde mixed 

 in equal parts. About one quart of 

 formaldehyde and water is placed in a 

 galvanized kerosene-can, and the gas or 

 steam is led through the spout and a 

 small rubber hose into the box of combs. 

 The kerosene-can is heated by a 2-wick 

 oil-stove, which sends out a lot of steam, 

 and two such arrangements are used 

 at the same time in fumigating the one 

 box of combs. After fumigating the box 

 of combs, the box is left air-tight for 

 about 24 hours. Then the combs are 

 taken out and well aired, and put away 

 to use the next season to catch swarms 

 on, or to use for anything we wish. 



This way does not always prove a 

 success, but usually does if care enough 

 is taken to give the combs a good fumi- 

 gating, and the combs are not too aiv- 

 fully bad with disease.. 



I ought to know something about doc- 

 toring foul brood, as we have had foul 

 brood in our county for 8 years. And 



