FEBRUARY 1, 1916 



107 



Some lurious example 

 as cheerfully as any bees, 

 twisted and deformed. 



, of malformation. These liees w I'Vv alive when found, running about the hive 

 Note that none of them have a full outfit of winss, and all of them are badly 



care for, so that some of the brood was 

 badly neglected — at any rate, the bee in the 

 center, for instanc^e, Avhich, instead of hav- 

 ing four wings, had only about half of one. 

 It did not have the appearance of having 

 had even the stub of the three other wings. 

 It seemed to have matured without them. 

 Perhai3s a sudden turn in the weather ar- 

 rested development, even tho these bees in 

 the larval stage might have been well sup- 

 plied with food. 



The bees in these illustrations were not 

 photographed alive, but were killed first by 

 being placed under water for fifteen or 

 twenty minutes, and then dried and sub- 



jected to tiie fumes of hydrocyanic gas for 

 aljout ten minutes. 1 have tried many ways 

 of killing bees, but none that result so well 

 as this plan. Bees kept under water even 

 for several hours often have an annoying 

 habit of coming to life again and crawling 

 about just when you are ready to photo- 

 graph them. If they are left under water 

 ten or twelve hours they "stay dead;" but, 

 strangely enough, they take on a rather 

 water-soaked appearance^ in spite of all that 

 can be done. If they are placed in the gas 

 alive they curl up and get into such un- 

 natural positions that it is impossible to 

 make them look lifelike. 



THE DISTRESS (OR SMOKE) METHOD OF INTRODUCING ; WHY MEN 



FAIL 



BY ARTHUR C. MILLER 



The following letter introduces the article : 



" I follow Mr. Miller's method up to 

 letting the queen run in at the entrance. 

 Previous to smoking*, a regular bee-escape 

 board is placed over the cone to receive the 

 (jueen. The colony, of course, is in one 

 liive-body. Then I proceed to smoke a la 

 Miller. Perhaps I had better say this bee- 

 escape board is made air-tight. A tight- 

 fitting plug (a block with a larger piece of 

 tin nailed on to it) is inserted in the hole 

 and all weighted down. 



" I had a small flat wire cage, IY2 x 1% 

 inches, which is open at one end. Into this 

 I put the queen. I think that, if the queen 

 is put into this cage without any attendants 

 for twenty to thirty minutes previous to 

 introducing, it will add the excellent fea- 

 tures of the starvation method. 



" Remove the plug from the bee-escape. 

 Send in a good puff or two of smoke- Put 

 the caged queen into this hole on the top 



of the frames and close up the hole. In 

 ten minutes give a small entrance (one 

 inch) ; an hour or so later, the full entrance. 

 " Mr. Miller says the frames should be % 

 inch above the bottom-board (page 370, 

 1913). While I believe this is necessary to 

 distribute the smoke, I believe it is almost 

 equal to the mistake he cites on page 511, 

 July 1, 1914, of introducing the queen to a 

 full-sized hive, and not filling up the empty 

 space to prevent the queen wandering into 

 it. If the queen goes directly on to frames, 

 well and good ; if not, I believe there will 

 be troul)le. Hence this method of i^utting 

 the queen directly on top of the frames." 

 St. Louis, Mo. J. H. FiSBECK- 



Mr. Fisbeck's use of an escape-board in 

 (jueen introduction is a very convenient ar- 

 rangement, and has been used by quite a 

 number of people. It is particularly good 

 where one's hives have only a small or shal- 

 low entrance, as it makes possible the prop- 



