I>EVOTEI> TO UEEf^i A.iVD HONEY, A.:XD ilOMI-:: HVJTJElHiST'W. 



Vol. IX. 



JUNE 1, 1881. 



No. 6. 



A. I. ROOT, 



Publisher and Froprielor^ 

 nicdina, O. 



Piiblislied Moutlily. 



\EstaUis\ed in 187 3. 



fTERMSn $1.00 Pek Axnim, in Advance; 

 I 2 Copies for $1.90; % for $2.75; 5 for $4.00; 10 

 I or more, 75 cts. each. Single Number, 10 ots. 

 Additions to clubs may be made at club 

 rates. Above are all to be sent to one Post- 

 office. Clubs to different pottolllces, not 

 LESS than 90 cts. each. 



NOTES FROITI THE BANNER APIARY. 



NO. 19. 



fJlO-DAY is May 11th, and I am so busy buying 

 bees, getting them home, and transferring 

 — ' them, that I hardly have time to think cf any 

 thing to write, much less to put in shape for publi- 

 cation; like friend Heddon, I have been foolish 

 enough to promise six regular contributions each 

 month, and, having made the promises, they must 

 be fulfilled. 



ABOUT QUEENS. 



A friend writes as follows: — 



Friend HrTcniNsoN: — We organized an association here last 

 week, and at the meeting we had quite .a discussion about im- 

 ported queens. Mr. Weed claimed that we did not need an im- 

 ported i^iieen to breed from, but I told him that we must chang-e 

 our Italian bees by imported stock, or very soon we will have 

 nothing but black bees. Please give your views in next (iLE.\N- 

 iNGs. Otto Kleixow. 



Detroit. Mich., May 9, 1881. 



If we are always careful to rear our queens from 

 pure queens, I do not see why we can not keep our 

 stock pure without an imported queen; but there 

 seems to be a "vim" about imported stock that is 

 obtainable in no other way, unless it is by crossing 

 with the blacks. I think a (yaot? imported queen is 

 very desirable property; but friend Rdot has hit 

 the nail on the head (I had my hammer all ready to 

 strike, but he was a little ahead of mc) in his re- 

 mnrks on page 237. You know that I told you, last 

 month, that i brought through only one colony, and 

 that was a swarm of blacks that I bought last fall, of 

 a man who had 38 swarms. All of his bees, except 

 one swarm, died last winter. Now, if I were not 

 rearing queens for sale, I should keep this black 

 queen, and breed from her; but as it is, her head 

 has been off some time. I tell you, my friends, I be- 

 lieve some of us are paying too much attention to 

 the looks of a queen; we should pay more attention 

 to the bees that she produces, and to what these bees 

 rio. 1 have seen some extra good swarms of bees 

 that had verj' commonplace-looking queens; just 

 the same as some of us smart men have very ordi- 

 nary-looking mothers. (No olTense intended.) 



Neighbor Long has a queen three years old, the 

 daughter of an imported queen, that has always out- 

 stripped every queen in his apiarj% and her swarm 

 has always stored the most honey, and has always 

 come through the winter in good condition. Out of 

 28 queens, neighbor L. brought through only 5 this 



spring. This queen was one of them. Now (as 

 friend Doolittle says), I should prefer queens reared 

 from this queen to those reared from en imported 

 queen that had not been thoroughly tested. 



W. Z. Hutchinson. 

 Rogcrsville, Genesee Co., Mich. 



I agree with you, friend II.; and the mat- 

 ter of choosing a queen to get cells from is 

 one that has just come up in our apiary. I 

 have had nearly a hundred nice queens, 

 reared from imported mothers last season 

 by neighbors Rice and Dean, to choose from. 

 I should have used the red-clover queen 

 largely, but she, too, is dead. All of my own 

 imported queens were lost. After consider- 

 ing the matter from all points, I felt that I 

 would prefer to have queens reared to send 

 out to you, from one of our finest imported 

 queens, and so we are using her. We should 

 use, also, an imported Cyprian or Holy-Land 

 queen, but I believe none have wintered 

 over in Medina Co., and friend Jones does 

 not seem to have any just at present, either. 



DOOIilTTIiE ANSWERS QUESTIONS. 



IMPROVEMENT OF BEES. 



fj? SEE in May Gleanings that Doolittle is called 

 Ji|[ upon to answer a few questions, first of which 

 " — ' is by J. F. Floury, in regard to breeding bees for 

 honey, or breeding from imported stock. I wish to 

 say about this, as I should on all other matters of 

 improvement, that if we settle down on the idea that 

 we have the best stock in the world, and that we 

 will try no further, but breed our own to perfection, 

 we may soon find ourselves behind others. Well, 

 what shall we do? buy an Imported queen and breed 

 wholly from her? No: do as those who are success- 

 ful in improvement do; i. e., if you have a good 

 thing, which you believe to be such, use that as a 

 means of success mainly; and in addition, try, on a 

 small scale, any thing that looks like being an im- 

 provement on what you already have; and after 

 you have proved such to be the case, adopt it, to the 

 exclusion of the other. For instance: as we are talk- 

 ing of improvement of bees, you will see on page 21, 

 Gleanings for Jan., 1881, 1 say, "Five hundred dol- 

 lars would not hire me to breed all my queens from 

 an imported mother, and let my present stock go 



