710 



November, 1907. 



American Hee Journal 



"Subscriber" is talking about one thing, 

 and the other gentlemen abotit an- 

 other; "Subscriber" referring to Italians 

 brought to perfection in the matter of 

 color, as in his own apiary, and the 

 others to Italians as they are imported 

 from Italy. Certainly there can be no 

 question that Italians as first imported 

 were entitled to be called pure Italians, 

 if any Italians can be called "pure," and 

 it can hardly be claimed that the stand- 

 ard has changed. As to whether bees 

 so modified in appearance as are the 

 all-over-goldens should also be called 

 pure Italians, opinions may differ. Some 

 would probably call them modified Ital- 

 ians, and their greatest admirers seem 

 to put them in a separate class by call- 

 ing them "goldens" — a term not applied 

 to pure Italians as imported from their 

 native land. 



Superseding Queens 



The question as to renewing queens is 

 one upon which there is a wide differ- 

 ence of- opinion. What may be best 

 for one inay not be best for another. 

 One inay think it best to take the mat- 

 ter in his own hands and each year re- 

 place his queens with young queens of 

 the current year's rearing as early as 

 such queens can be reared or bought. 

 He mn7 thus have a pretty strong guar- 

 antee against all swarming. Another 

 may think it best to leave the matter 

 of superseding entirely in the hands of 

 the bees. He will tell you that his 

 queens are generally superseded before 

 they are too old for good service, and 

 the few which are left till too old will 

 cause him less loss than it would cost 

 him to replace his queens regularly at a 

 certain age. 



For many — perhaps for the great ma- 

 jority — a combination of the two plans 

 is best. Let close watch be kept as to 

 what is being done by each colony; if 

 very poor work is done, by any par- 

 ticular colony, replace the queen just 

 as soon as convenient, whether the queen 

 be old or young. Some queens less than 

 a year old are poor, and a very poor 

 queen may be superseded by the bees 

 when only a few weeks old. But even 

 if the bees promptly supersede a young 

 queen that is poor, her royal progeny 

 will be also. 



Now is the tirne of year to figure up 

 on the work of each colony. Those 

 which, having had a good chance, have 

 yielded less than the average, should 

 be marked for renewal as early as profit- 

 able ne.xt season. This constant weed- 

 ing out of poor queens is important, as 

 well as breeding from the best. You 

 may breed from the best with all the 

 care you please, if you do not weed out 

 poor queens you stand a chance of hav- 

 ing the drones of. these poor queens 

 mate with your young queens. 



Does the Bee Start the Flow of Nec- 

 tar? 



A member of the American Bee Jour- 

 nal family challenges the statement of 

 Prof. Tanzer in the first full paragraph 

 on page 688. and asks whether there is 

 any proof for the statement that the 

 first bee that visits a flower gets no 

 nectar, but merely starts business for 

 the rest. 



Whether one knows exactly the truth 

 about such things or not may make no 

 difference in the number of pounds of 

 honey secured in a season, yet the more 

 fully we are informed as to all that 

 goes on in matters pertaining to the 

 realm of beedom, the more enjoyment 

 we may have in the pursuit of our voca- 

 tion. And surely it is better to have 

 the dollars plus the enjoyment than it 

 is to have merely all the dollars that 

 can be had out of the business. Some- 

 times, too, it happens that matters that 

 seem to have no connection whatever 

 with the practical side of bee-keeping 

 have yet a very important bearing; al- 

 though that bearing may be very indi- 

 rect. 



Ignorance must be frankly admitted 

 as to whether or no there is good 

 ground for the statement in question. If 

 any one before has said anything of the 

 kind, it has certainly not come very promi- 

 nently into public notice. Cheshire goes 

 into such subjects more fully than most 

 writers on bee-keeping matters, and he 

 says nothing of the kind. Does any one 

 of our bee-books give anjihing corrob- 

 orative? If what Prof. Tanzer says are 

 facts, they are most surely interesting 

 facts, and is it not strange that others 

 should not mentioii them? 



It will doubtless occur to many that 

 in the hot-house, in the middle of win- 

 ter, an abundant secretion of nectar may 

 be found on some flowers, and in this 

 case no first visit of a bee could be ef- 

 fective. 



But we are open to conviction, for 

 many a truth has be^n brought to light 

 that was not in accord with previously 

 accepted views. Our columns are open 

 for any light that may be given, and 

 perhaps Prof. Tanzer himself will be 

 willing to contribute thereto. 



Value of Honey as Food 



The following note is brought out by 

 the article on page 689: 



"Mr. Editor : — I wish you w^ould look 

 carefully over what Dr. Eaton says, 

 page 6gi, and then give us the benefit 

 of an editorial opinion as to which is 

 right. Prof. Tanzer or Dr. Eaton." 



That is asking a good deal, is it not, 

 for one of the laity to decide in a 

 case where two men with handles to 

 their names differ? But a cat may look 

 at a king, and there may be no harm 

 in saying just how the case looks to an 

 outsider. 



Dr. Eaton says: "I am inclined to 

 doubt scientific basis for the statement 

 that certain foods build up the higher 

 faculties." Prof. Tanzer speaks of "the 

 assimilation of foods which reaches out 

 to the building up of the higher facul- 

 ties." If by that Prof. Tanzer means 

 that so many grams of a certain food 

 will produce so many impulses of love 

 to the neighbor, and that certain grams 

 of another food will produce so many 

 tenths of a grouch, then it may be left 

 to the propounder of such a theory to 

 defend it. But is that necessarily the 

 interpretation of Prof. Tanzer's words? 

 We all know that a man suffering from 

 a fit of indigestion is more likely to 

 give way to a fit of ill temper than orie 

 whose digestion is perfect, and so in 

 this case there is relation between the 



assimilation of food and the higher fac- 

 ulties. M'ay not Prof. Tanzer have had 

 in mind some such thought as this? 

 And is it not true that with perfect di- 

 gestion and . assimilation the faculties 

 of the mind are more likely to be in 

 good trim than when something goes 

 wrong in the digestive tract? 



Dr. Eaton also doubts scientific basis 

 for the statement that "it is advisable 

 to eschew eggs and milk because the 

 flesh of the animals which furnish them 

 is used for food." In reading what 

 Prof. Tanzer says in the last columns 

 on page 689, it did not occur to the 

 present writer that eating the flesh of 

 beef and poultry was given as a reason 

 why eggs and milk should be eschewed. 

 Indeed, it did not at all occur that 

 Prof. Tanzer meant to advise against 

 eating eggs and milk. He would hardly 

 advise such an astounding thing as cut- 

 ting milk out of the dietary of a babe 

 at its mother's breast. What probably 

 will be understood by most readers as 

 Prof. Tanzer's meaning is something 

 like this : "We do not eat the flesh of 

 the insect that produces the honey, 

 neither should we eat the flesh of the 

 cow that produces the milk, nor of the 

 hen that produces the egg." 



As to the constituent parts of hon- 

 ey, there is no small difference in differ- 

 ent analyses, owing to differences in 

 different samples of honey, and perhaps 

 for other reasons as well. That is a 

 matter for analysts to determine. Prof. 

 Tanzer has plenty of company in be- 

 lieving that honey contains formic acid ; 

 indeed, that is the general belief; but 

 the proof of its presence may not be 

 sufficient to satisfy Dr. Eaton's mind. 



As to Dr. Eaton's last paragraph, 

 there is probably no difference of opin- 

 ion between the two writers. A stick 

 of firewood may contain many calories of 

 heat, but a stick of firewood is hardly 

 a proper article of food. 



Books for Bee-Keepers 



Every bee-keeper should have a bee- 

 book besides a bee-paper. On another 

 page will be found all the best books 

 offered — either at a price, postpaid, or as 

 a premium. If you can not earn them 

 as premiums for getting new subscrip- 

 tions, it will pay you well to purchase 

 one or more of them. You will find 

 them of great value. There are so many 

 things in the books that are needful to 

 know, and that of course could not be 

 told over and over again in the bee- 

 papers. If a bee-keeper can afford only 

 one, it would better be the book rath- 

 er than the paper. But now that the 

 American Bee Journal is only 50 cents 

 a year, of course, no bee-keeper, how- 

 ever limited his apiary may be, can af- 

 ford to be without its monthly visits. 



Color of Raspberry Honey 



E. D. Townsend says in the Bee- 

 Keepers' Review that the view enter- 

 tained by some that raspberry honey 

 is amber is incorrect, at least as ap- 

 plies to the raspberry honey obtained 

 on the sandy loam of Northern Michi- 

 gan. It is so light in color that it may 

 easily be mistaken for white-clover 

 honey. 



