AUGUST 15, 1916 



CONVERSATIONS with DOOLITTLE 



VALUE OF DRONES. 



*' I am a beginner in beekeeping", 

 but have read quite a little about 

 apiculture. I note that you and 

 other writers propose to allow each 

 colony only a meager quantity of 

 drone comb so that a greater 

 of honey may be stored thru the 



amount 



gathering- of a maximum number of workers 

 being reared in all-worker comb except two 

 or three inches square left to comfort the 

 bees along the drone line. Now are you not 

 mistaken here? I cannot believe that nature 

 makes a mistake in providing drones. Are 

 not these drones of value aside from their 

 use for the fertilization of queens? " 



Modern beekeeping has taken the bees out 

 of their primitive state, where they were in 

 isolated places, rarely more than one colo- 

 ny in any locality; and with colonies sever- 

 al miles apart there had to be enough drones 

 in each colony to make it an almost absolute 

 certainty that the young queen of this colo- 

 ny would surely find one in the few minutes 

 to one-fourtli hour that she was out in the 

 air; otherwise she would be more liable to 

 become the prey of some king-bird or other 

 enemy which might abound in the place 

 where the colony was located. Upon her 

 life the very existence of the colony de- 

 pends, as more often than otherwise there 

 is no other means left for the continuance 

 of repi'oduction in the colony. All beekeep- 

 ers of any experience know what little 

 chance there is for a colony whose queen 

 is lost in her mating-flight, if a fjueen-cell 

 or young brood is not given by the atten- 

 tive apiarist. 



Under our modern and more successful 

 management these primitive conditions are 

 changed. The colonies being massed of 

 congregated together in large number, it is 

 quite evident that the drones cf a few colo- 

 nies will serve the same purpose that they 

 would have served where one-fourth of the 

 comb covered by one colony was of the 

 drone size of cell. It is, therefore, reason- 

 able to suppose that it is useless to rear 

 such a number of drones in each of the 

 colonies congregated together in an apiary 

 of from 20 to 200 colonies. 



T have made several careful experiments 

 by way of massing three or four Langstrotli 

 frames quite well tilled with drone brood 

 from different colonies, set apart as drone- 

 rearers, in order that these drones might be 

 kept for mating with queens after other 

 inferior drones had been killed off at the 

 end of the hnney-flow, and have always 



At Borodino, New York 



found that the drones from these three or 

 four frames would consume about all of the 

 honey brought in during the late honey- 

 flow, while colonies of the same strength 

 with only an inch or two of drone brood 

 would store a surplus of from 50 to 100 lbs. 



Our questioner thinks we are mistaken, 

 but he gives us no proof save that he 

 believes that nature makes no mistake. In 

 answeiing his question in regard to drones 

 being of value aside from the fertilization 

 of queens, I will ask, "How can they be?'' 

 They do not work; they fill themselves with 

 honey from the combs every time they fly 

 from the hive; they are never seen out on 

 the clover or any other bloom, and their 

 rearing decreases the number of workers 

 reared. Are not these facts sufficient to 

 incite any beekeeper to prevent their pro- 

 duction in numbers limited only by nature? 

 It seems hardly necessary to theorize on the 

 l^rofit, and the approximate amount saved by 

 their suppression. In a square inch of 

 comb, approximately 55 workers may be 

 reared, while the same space will furnish 

 room for about .36 drones, figuring both 

 sides of the comb. Thus in a square foot 

 of comb where 5000 drones could be reared, 

 we may rear approximately 8000 workers. 

 Would it be unreasonable to say that the 

 same amount of food will rear either brood, 

 since it occupies the same space? And 

 when they have emerged, we have a small 

 swarm of workers instead of a heap of 

 useless, bothersome, voracious feeders that 

 do nothing but loaf, but are sure to come 

 home to eat. After they are reared, to get 

 rid of them drone-traps must be provided. 

 And these are a nuisance to the worker bees 

 and their keeper. Better not rear them at 

 all. If we have taken pains to make sure 

 of a sufficient number in one or two of our 

 best drone-breeding colonies, why go upon 

 some imaginary idea to permit their pro- 

 duction in every colony? Try your best to 

 get rid of the drone comb, and you will still 

 find more' inferior drones than you wish. 



I am sure that every beginner will do 

 well if he removes the largest patches of 

 di'one comb in all his hives, replacing the 

 same with worker comb, except in such 

 colonies as are set apart as breeders, as 

 mentioned before. Of late it has seemed to 

 me that tlie advantage of removing the 

 drone combs and replacing them with work- 

 er comb, or foundation, is sufficiently ap- 

 parent to m.ake the matter a question of 

 very serious consideration among practical 

 beekeejiers. 



