802 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Aug 15 



outyards, some four or five miles distant 

 from the city. 



Mr. Weber, in the business which he has 

 developed, and into which he has poured 

 his whole soul, is most ably assisted in it 

 by his only son, Mr. Chas. H. Weber, Jr., 

 born in 1880, and his daughter. Miss Em- 

 ma Weber, born Feb. 29, 1884. When the 

 writer called at their store late last fall it 

 was very apparent that both the son and 

 daughter were about their father's busi- 

 ness; and what was particularly noticeable 

 was that they were not afraid of work. 

 Charley seemed to he thoroughly posted in 

 every detail of the business, superintending 

 the supply trade, and at certain seasons of 

 the year goes out r n the road as salesman 

 for honey. Miss Emma attends to all cor- 

 respondence and book-keeping. She it is 

 who looks after the grading, and during the 

 absence of her brother superintends the 

 honey department, seeing that all the goods 

 are put up perfectly clean and neat, and 

 nicely labeled. 



At the time of my visit the Webers had 

 just received a carload of comb honey that 

 came in a broken-down condition. Emma 

 was engaged in sorting the honey over, 

 cutting out that which was badly broken, 

 and putting it into a barrel to be sold for 

 chunk honey. 



It was quite a cold day for Cincinnati, I 

 should judge, and I remember there was a 

 roaring fire in the stove. All at once I 

 heard a feminine voice calling out, " Char- 

 ley! come here quick! " Distinctly do I re- 

 member how Charley bounded over the cases 

 of honey until he reached the side of his 

 sister, who called his attention to the fact 

 that the crates next to the aforesaid stove 

 were scorching badly, and that there was 

 danger of injuring the honey. Greatly to 

 my surprise. Miss Emma, without calling 

 for ai3y man help, and saying " Oh dear!" 

 in utter helplessness, grabbed hold of one 

 end of those heavy cases, motioning her 

 brother to do likewise at the other end, and 

 carried them further away from the stove. 

 In this way the two picked up and moved 

 hundreds of pounds of honey almost before 

 I could collect my thoughts. I did not at 

 that time know that the girl was Miss Web- 

 er, for it seems she was dressed to do a 

 messy piece of work, and evidently did not 

 care to make her identity known, especial- 

 ly to one who sometimes writes up what he 

 sees. In the convention that was held that 

 evening I recognized the same young wo- 

 man who is here shown, and was then giv- 

 en a formal introduction. Notwithstanding 

 the young lady is capable of lifting heavy 

 crates of honey, she is neither large nor 

 masculine in appearance, but, on the con- 

 trary, as her picture shows, the very oppo- 

 site. 



Any father may well be proud of two 

 such able assistants, who have not been 

 spoiled by luxurious surroundings, but 

 ha/e been taught to know the value of hon- 

 orable work. Nor wonder Mr. Weber's 

 business has been crowned with success. 



m^z 



THE SENSE OF SMELL IN THE BEE. 



The Office of the Antenos. 



BY E. F. PHILLIPS, PH. D. , OF THE UNIVER- 

 SITY OF PENNSYLVANIA. 



Any one who has observed bees has seen 

 that they are guided very largely in their 

 movements by the sense of smell. Bees have 

 been known to fly a mile or more over wa- 

 ter to reach flowers on an opposite bank 

 toward which they could be guided only by 

 scent. 



The celebrated naturalist Huber first 

 discovered that the organs of smell in the 

 bee are located in the antenna;, and he per- 

 formed some interesting experiments by 

 cutting ofi^ the antenna; and thus depriving 

 the bees of their power of detecting odors. 

 I have recently repeated some of his exper- 

 iments on workers, drones, and queens, 

 wilh some modifications, and all my re- 

 sults confirm his position. 



Concerning the queen, Huber says, 

 "When one of her antenna; is cut ofi", no 

 change takes place in the behavior of the 

 queen. If you cut off both antenna? near 

 the head, this mother, formerly held in such 

 high consideration by her people, loses all 

 her influence, and even the maternal in- 

 stinct disappears. Instead of layinghereggs 

 in the cells she drops them here and there. " 

 As is well known, a young virgin queen 

 is normally accepted without any difficulty 

 by any colony which has been queenlesa 

 long enough to know its qucenless condi- 

 tion. In experimenting along this line I 

 cut the antenna; from a virgin queen about 

 three hours old, and put her on the comb 

 of an observatory hive, and she was at once 

 balled. This was repeated with another 

 hive. She was rescued from the workers, 

 and confined in the hive in an introducing- 

 cage containing candy, but in a short time 

 died, probably of starvation, for I am sure 

 she was not stung by the bees in the ball, 

 for she was taken out at once and I never 

 lost sight of her. Although there was can- 

 dy in her cage she evidently did not recog- 

 nize it as food, since she was not attracted 

 to it by smell, and on account of the loss of 

 her antennae she was not fed through the 

 meshes of the wire cloth. 



When the workers are deprived of their 

 antennse they remain inactive in the hive, 

 and soon desert it since they are attracted 

 only by light. I cut the antenna? from sev- 

 eral workers, and marked them on the tho- 

 rax to make it more easy to follow their ac- 

 tions, and then put them in an observatory 



