1921 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



147 



and has no such renewal. There is 

 something infinitely tragic and inconi- 

 prehensible in the wondrous garments 

 and beauty of many insects, who wear 

 their splendors for but a day, and 

 having bred, and laid their eggs, die. 



In the honeybee we have a form of 

 life which, with the ants and a very 

 few allied species, takes the same re- 

 lationship to the lower orders that 

 man does to the warm-blooded, verte- 

 brate animals. They display a highly 

 complex organization, and a great 

 elaboration of the simpler forms and 

 processes of life. Within hist rical 

 times they have not changed ii the 

 least, and their actions can be calculat- 

 ed with certainty if we know the sur- 

 roundings and impulse that are acting 

 upon them. The art of beekeeping, 

 as expressed in the production of 

 honey is strictly empirical, that is, it 

 has resulted from the observing of 

 these actions and stimuli, and the de- 

 vising of apparatus, etc., to meet 

 them. We do not, however, under- 

 stand in the least the underlying mys- 

 teries, and we in all probability never 

 shall. 



Manitoba. 



QUEEN INTRODUCTION 



By C. E. Fowler 



On page 57, January American Bee 

 Journal, Allen Latham gives us a very 

 good article on ''100 Per Cent Intro- 

 duction," but he doesn't say whether 

 he means 100 per cent of queens in a 

 week or a month or 100 per ceivt of 

 the amount of time required or the 

 financial advantage of the different 

 methods of introduction. He hints at 

 the advantages and disadvantages of 

 different methods. 



A few years ago I introduced 12 

 queens in 12 swarms of about 4 

 pounds of bees in each by the regu- 

 lar cage method without losing a 

 queen; 100 per cent, but in a month's 

 time five queens were superseded, 

 leaving 58 1-3 per cent. Why they 

 were superseded, I am like Dr. Miller, 

 "I don't know," but I can guess. When 

 a queen is laying 2,000 eggs a day and 

 is mailed a thousand miles in a cage 

 where she can't lay an egg and is put 

 in the hive in the cage for a few days 

 and can't lay any eggs, and the bees 

 release her and think she looks nice 

 and are well satisfied; but she can- 

 not lay a regular supply of eggs for 

 several more days, why should they 

 not begin to worry and start a queen- 

 cell and take a notion to destroy the 

 queen? So I have studied up a new- 

 way of introducing queens which I 

 think not only saves most of that 

 41 2-3 per cent but gives the queen 

 about 4 days extra laying, which 

 would equal one or two pounds of 

 bees and some seasons of the year 

 may be worth dollars. 



I make two wire cloth frames and 

 put one on each side of a frame of 

 hatching brood, take the perforated 

 tin off the cage and put it on one 

 side of the brood on the side where 

 the most bees are trying to get out. 



In 24 hours there may be 1,000 bees 

 hatched out and the queen has 1,000 

 places to lay, and if you let her out 



by taking the wire frames off she not 

 only has 1,000 friends (more or less), 

 l)Ut she has her laying machine in 

 working order, and I think 100 per 

 cent of your queens are safe from su- 

 persedure, but not safe from accident. 



If a greenhorn looks in the hive 

 every day and occasionally (if smoked 

 at the entrance) the queen is on the 

 lid and he puts it on the ground lean- 

 ing against something, and then hunts 

 for the queen in the hive and can't 

 find her, and while he is looking for 

 the queen she crawls off the cover and 

 he leaves her in the grass, the 100 

 per cent is broken. 



Allan Latham says a breeding queen 

 should never be subjected to any 

 other method than that of letting her 

 loose upon combs of hatching brood, 

 kept warm by artificial heat. 



I tried that method once on a select 

 untested queen and left the entrance 

 open and never saw the queen again. 

 100 per cent — 100 per cent. The queen 

 would not be in a natural position, 

 with nothing but hatching brood (I 

 will say emerging brood) and artificial 

 heat, especially if the heating ap- 

 paratus was made by some amateur. 



I am surprised that Latham should 

 put the cages on: the top of the 

 frames. I always put them between 

 frames in the middle, so the bees will 

 keep them warm and get acquainted 

 more easily. The frames I spread far 

 enough so the bees can get on the 

 wire of the cage and the cage resting 

 on two nails pushed in the comb. 



I made my frames of wire netting, 

 8 to the inch, and the bees can feed 

 through and get acquainted more eas- 



iiy. 



Some mosquito netting is 14 to the 

 inch, and should not be used. 



A friend of mine had foulbrood and 

 [ was helping him, and he killed the 

 old queen against a small pear tree, 

 and the swarm clustered on the tree, 

 where the odor of the queen was lo- 

 cated. 



We scrubbed the tree with soap 

 and water. The bees clustered again. 

 We brushed them off and dumped 

 them in the hive. Then we put car- 

 bolic acid on the tree, but they would 

 cluster. He cut the tree down, then 



the bees tried to get into the wrong 

 hive and got killed by the quart. 



The next time I introduced queens 

 I tried this way: I caught the old 

 queen and killed her against the new 

 queen cage, but never saw much ad- 

 vantage, and I hated to do it. 



Now when I kill the old queen I 

 make a hole in the ground with my 

 toes and bury her so the bees cannot 

 find the odor, as I have seen the bees 

 find a new queen (in cage) in a shed 

 and a hundred bees covered it in a 

 few minutes. I don't know why they 

 did it, but I had to hide the queen 

 cages. 



I have nothing against Latham, for 

 I have used his queens and think they 

 are very fine. 



While talking about queens I want 

 to ask Latham a question. 



I bought some queens last year. I 

 am not sure, but I think they were 

 Latham's. It was 4 or 5 days before 

 I put them in, and in one cage every 

 bee was dead but the queen, and in 

 another cage every bee was alive but 

 the queen, and I noticed the queen 

 was curled up, but I did not know 

 why, so I put the live queen in with 

 the live bees, and before I knew it 

 one bee stung the queen to death and 

 the queen curled up same as the other 

 one. 



Why did the bees sting the first 

 one? Why the second one? It was 

 perhaps my fault, for not introducing 

 as soon as I got them. I only lost $3. 

 Some queens are worth $10 for the 

 extra amount of honey their bees 

 store in one year. 



New Jersey. 



LAVENDER 



By Ph. J. Baldensperger 

 In your recent numbers you re- 

 produced various articles on lavender. 

 Here is what we have in the Alps : 



1. Lavendula Stoechas (Linn). The 

 bushes carrying this lavender grow all 

 along the lowlands in porphyraceous 

 soil, and going up the rocky hills to 

 a hundred metres (330 feet) above the 

 level of the sea, from Menton to 

 Toulon, in the pine forests of the Es- 

 terel and Maures regions. 

 The bushes grow densely and are 



Mr. Snodderly's apiary in Omaha, where bcckci. 



-uibincd with fruit growing. 



