690 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



glands of the head and thorax. Dr. Reiden- 

 baeh does not believe that formic acid orig- 

 inates in the body of the bee, but holds it to 

 be a product of oxidation of sugar. Dr. 

 Merl, director of the laboratory for food 

 analysis in Munich, after extensive investi- 

 gation, thinks that Reidenbach's theory is 

 ]>robably correct. Dr. Merl asserts that 

 during winter neither head, thorax, nor ab- 

 domen contains even a trace of formic acid. 

 He will continue his investigation in the 

 near future on field bees — bees gathering- 

 nectar. 



blossom secretes,] He thought first that this 

 Tunisien bee swarmed more than the black 

 bee of the Continent, but finds now that it 

 does not. With the Arabs it had to swarm 

 on account of the limited space given them. 

 A cylinder made of reeds about 40 inches 

 long and 8 inches in diameter is used as a 

 hive. Ml". Becker is in charge of an apiary 

 of 500 colonies. They rear queens the year 

 round, but sell only the best of them. He 

 says it is a pleasure to keep bees there, be- 

 cause they have a good honey-flow tju 

 months in the year. — Leipziger Btzg. 



INSTINCT OF SELF-PRESERVATION IN BEES. 



R. made in July, 1910, an artificial in- 

 crease. He used the queen and brood from 

 an Italian and older bees from a black 

 colon}'. In August the weather was bad — 

 the colony was short of stores. One day a 

 bunch of black bees were found dead in the 

 rear of the hive. No doubt the Italians had 

 crowded or pushed them away from the 

 combs containing the rest of the stores so 

 they died of starvation. It was not race 

 hatred nor emnity, but limited stores that 

 prompted the bees. The old bees could be 

 easily spared. Self-preservation prompted 

 the bees to free the colony from useless con- 

 sumers on account of small stores and noth- 

 ing coming in. 



The same thing was obsei^'ed in 1912. An 

 Italian colony that had swarmed in June 

 had a very fertile queen, consuming consid- 

 erable stores to rear brood. In August the 

 young bees pushed the old ones away from 

 the combs that contain a little food on to the 

 empty combs in the rear, where they would 

 soon die of starvation. When the cover was 

 taken oft^ the old bees rushed out, but were 

 refused admittance between the other 

 frames, and the entrance was also securely 

 guarded against them. Some of the old bees 

 had already died from exhaustion and star- 

 vation. This colony was fed, and the old 

 bees at once received their freedom and 

 access to the stores. The death-sentence was 

 magnanimously set aside as .soon as the colo- 

 ny was fed and the fear of starvation re- 

 moved. — Muenchener Bienenzeitunrj. 

 * « » 



BEEKEEPING IN TUNIS. 



Mr. Becker writes that the bee is as black 

 there as the black bee of the Continent. He 

 asserts that this TunLsien bee visits flowers, 

 and that the bee of the Continent does not, 

 and concludes from this that the Tunisien 

 bee has a longer tongue than the European 

 ■j'aces. It is simjily astonishing the quantity 

 cf honey it gathers. [This depends prob- 

 ably on the profusion of nectar that each 



BEEKEEPING IN THE ARGENTINE REPUBLIC. 



A French beekeeper writes in Apiculteur 

 that the movable-frame hive is hardly known 

 there. The swarms are hived in boxes with 

 an entrance in the front and rear. Besides, 

 it has usually a dozen or more cracks and 

 crevices which permit a free entrance to the 

 bees and their enemies. Frames with foun- 

 dation or pieces of combs are not used in 

 these boxes. The bees build at random in 

 any way they wish. If the owner notices 

 that the bees have som.e honey in the box he 

 takes it out by using a great deal of very 

 strong penetrating smoke. He waits until 

 the bees have honey again, and then repeats 

 the operation. This robbing of honey and 

 hiving the swarms is about all the native 

 beekeeper does. This French beekeeper has 

 now 170 modern hives. The first year his 

 crop was 7700 lbs.; the second, 15,000 lbs. 

 from 100 colonies, and the last year, from 

 170 colonies, 24,000 lbs. The jDasture is very 

 very good; a large part of the land abounds 

 in good bee-plants. The best is alfalfa. He 

 lias 600 acres of it. The honey-flow begins 

 in July with the fruit bloom, and lasts until 

 tiie rainv season begins in March. — Rhein. 

 Bztg. 



* * » 



THE POLITEST BEEKEEPERS IN THE WORLD. 



The Chinese are polite toward everybody, 

 especially the bees, because they have a 

 queen. They don't want to kill a queen — 

 not even insult one. If he wants to take 

 honey from the bees he begs them to give 

 him some from their affluence, and says: 

 " You have your house filled with SAveets 

 while we have only paprica and bread to 

 eat." At the same time he makes compli- 

 ments, and burns sweet incense. The bees 

 retreat on account of the smoke. The tailed 

 beekeeper interprets that as assent to his 

 polite request for honey, and cuts out the 

 tilled combs. Honey is comparatively ex- 

 I)ensive in China, and principally used for 

 medicine. — Illustr. Ulnnatslil. 



Kempten, Bavaria, Germany. 



