GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Uri Hammond, Vivian, Louisiana. Master Hammond has " kept bees " in two States. 



You speak of '' a sudden and violent 

 reversion of type . . . changed in color 

 from the time of grafting to hatching." I 

 do not understand that a change occurs 

 during that time from atavism, but rather 

 that atavism dates back to the earliest time 

 of the germ. And j^et it is quite possible 

 tliat the change might have occurred in 

 color during those few days; for cool 

 weather, scant food, or some other circum- 

 stance may sometimes make the royal prog- 

 eny of a pure Italian queen quite dark in 

 color, when her previous and subsequent 

 progeny appears as yellow as herself. But 

 that's not atavism. 



After all this has been said, it remains 

 an open question whether there was any 



black blood at all in the case. There may 

 or tliere may not have been. You do not 

 say, for you say nothing about the worker- 

 progeny of these dark queens. And that's 

 the deciding factor. If the worker-progeny 

 be mixed as to the matter of yellow bands, 

 the queen can not claim to be pure, no mat- 

 ter how yellow. If the workers are uni- 

 formly tln-ee-banded, then the queen need 

 not hesitate to claim purity, be she black 

 as night. Some queens direct from Italy 

 are as dark as queens of black blood, but 

 their workers are all right as to color. 



You may have had a case of atavism ; but 

 it is not at all proven, and is quite doubt- 

 ful. C. C. Miller. 



Marengo, 111. 



FOUR HUNDRED QUEENS FROM ONE COLONY 



BY ARTHUR C. MILLER 



In a recent issue of Gleanings I spoke 

 of one colony of bees producing about four 

 hundred fine queen-cells in one season, and 

 being- a rousing colony at the finish. The 

 editor tells me that many of his readers 

 want the particulars, and no wonder they 

 do; for either I told a "whopper" or else 

 have something' worth dollars to the frater- 

 nity. 



Tt is worth dollars to all who will master 

 it ; but I tell you at the start it is not for 

 the careless man nor for the man who fails 



to do the right thing at the right time in the 

 right way. On the other hand, it calls for 

 less work, less care, and less attention by 

 many times, than it does to produce the 

 same number of cells by any other system. 

 Not only is its cost in labor much less per 

 cell, but its cost in colonies is very markedly 

 smaller. 



According to commonly accepted belief, 

 a coluiiv will not (or can not) construct 

 m.ore than about one dozen good cells at a 

 time, and should never be used to construct 



