GLEANINGS T X P. R K V T' I. T T R R 



Junk, 1921 



deney, lie selcils tlu' yi'llowcst queens to 

 send out as select untested. If he is pay- 

 ing little or no attention to color, he merely 

 selects the queens that present the best ap- 

 pearance, according to his idea as to what a 

 perfect queen should look like. So it just 

 comes down to the fact that the man who 

 bu.ys select untested queens is paying most- 

 ly for looks. The queens selected are not 

 necessarily any better to head a colony run 

 for honey than the ordinary untested 

 queens. If the queen-breeder sold only the 

 select untested queens and pinched off the 

 heads of all the balance, it would make the 

 price of queens prohibitive. For instance, 

 suppose the queen-breeder has an order for 

 six select untested queens. He goes into 

 his queen-yard and out of a lot of probably 

 .'50 untested queens he selects six that come 

 tlie nearest to looking like his ideal of a 

 queen. Now, suppose he is selling untested 

 queens at $2.00 each, and select untested at 

 .$2.2.5 each. By selling six at $2.2.5 each, 

 $1:5.50, and the other 24 at $2.00 each, or 

 $48.00, he realizes $61.50 for the lot of .SO 

 (jueens. If he is always to kill all but the 

 select queens, he must get as much for the 

 six select queens as he should have realized 

 for the 30 queens, or go out of the business 

 of raising queens. I know that some queen- 

 breeders claim they raise only select queens, 

 but they will hnve to show me before I am 

 convinced. 



Classifying Tested Queens. 

 Passing on to tested queens, we find some- 

 what the same state of affairs. Suppose we 

 examine a number of colonies and see what 

 we find. We open the first hive and find 

 the bees show three yellow bands. We de- 

 cide at once that the queen is a purely- 

 mated Italian. Looking more closely we 

 find many bees that do not show all the 

 characteristic markings of the Italians. The 

 third band is not very clear on some of 

 them and some of the bees are small. The 

 brood in the combs is not packed in closely, 

 many cells remaining vacant. The force of 

 bees seems to be running down, and, if the 

 main harvest is on, they are not doing good 

 work in the super. While this is a tested 

 queen, she is not good, and we mark her 

 hive for recjueening at the first opportun- 



ity. She is ;i cull that has gotten by in in- 

 troducing, or she may be an old and failing 

 queen. In any event, she is not to be sold 

 to anybody at any price. 



The next hive opened shows the bees with 

 all the characteristic markings of their race, 

 the yellow bands about the same width on 

 nearly all the bees. The combs are fairly 

 well filled with brood, evenly placed, but 

 showing a few vacant cells here and there. 

 The colony is in a thrifty condition, and 

 the pros])ect is that we shall get a fair av- 

 eiage crop of surplus from it. Upon exam- 

 ining the queen, she may or may not show 

 all the characteristic markings of the pure 

 Italian. She may be a little off color, or 

 jjossibly a little under the size of our ideal 

 queen. But her work shows that she is a 

 valuable queen to head a colony run for 

 honey, so we may shiji her out as a tested 

 (lueen. 



Select Tested Queens and Breeders. 



The next hive opened shows bees with all 

 the characteristic markings of their race. 

 They are apparently of good size, and even 

 color. The brood is closely packed in the 

 combs, hardly a cell being left vacant, and 

 the general condition of the colony shows 

 they are prospering. The queen is large and 

 fine looking, with all the characteristic 

 markings of her race. The colony really 

 may not be any more prosperous, or give 

 promise of any better results in the super 

 tlian the last colony examined; but on ac- 

 count of the better appearance of the queen, 

 she is placed in the class from which breed- 

 ers are selected, and we call her a select 

 tested queen. Breeding queens are merely 

 select tested queens that have been trie<l 

 out as Vjreeders and found satisfactory. 



I hope I have. made the matter clear. I 

 am sure every conscientious queen-breeder 

 will pretty nearly agree with me. If I have 

 succeeded in making it clear to every one, 

 we shall probably hear less about beheading- 

 all but one class of queens, for there re.ally 

 are two classes of both untested and tested 

 queens; and the conscientious queen-breeder 

 is trying his best to give each customer 

 value received on every order, according to 

 the class of queens ordered. 



Cnllallen, Tex. 



