28 



THE AMERICAN APIGULTURIST. 



who uses his brain but little has 

 but little to use. The sedentary 

 man is always weak, and physi- 

 cally inefficient. The horse that 

 has stood in the barn without any 

 exercise for weeks, is denominated 

 " soft " and is not fit for hard mus- 

 cular effort. 



A horse is lame in the foot. 

 Certain muscles of the shoulder, 

 now in disuse, sink away and the 

 pseudo-veterinarian treats him for 

 the so-called swinney. This is 

 only an atrophy of the muscles, 

 consequent upon disuse, and no 

 disease in itself. 



Now the queen bee, after her 

 " marriage flight" — which occurs 

 very soon after her maturity — does 

 not use her organs of flight at all 

 for a year, or till she leads a swarm 

 from the hive, when, with the ma- 

 jority of the bees, she goes forth, 

 and by use of muscles, long in 

 disuse, she rapidly wings her way 

 over meadow and woodland, some- 

 times for miles, before she and 

 her attendants reach the new home, 

 already preempted. Here then is 

 an anomaly, which, so far as I 

 know, finds no parallel among ani- 

 mals. 



True, some contend that the 

 queen does take recreation trips 

 in the interims of swarming and 

 mating tours ; but such assertions 

 are mere conjectures. 



Among some other of the social 

 Hymenoptera, there is a less strik- 

 ing illustration of the same curious 

 fact. The queen bumble bee, 

 however, does much work, which 

 the queen honey bee leaves wholly 

 to the workers. Early in the 



season she does all the gathering. 

 It is not probable either that she 

 indulges in many, if anj', long 

 flights, after she settles down to 

 exclusive egg-laying. 



We see from the above that 

 clipping the queen's wing is no in- 

 jury to her ; in fact it is an infin- 

 itesimal gain, as there is a little 

 less tissue to nourish, and that a 

 perfectly useless part except as the 

 queen may need it to fly forth with 

 a swarm. 



Whether then we should clip or 

 not should depend entirely upon 

 our own ideas of its wisdom as 

 regards ease of manipulation, con- 

 venience and, possibly, our notions 

 of beauty. 



The ants which, as Lubbock 

 shows, are intellectually equal to 

 the highest of animals, in some 

 respects, are not deterred by aes- 

 thetic notions in this matter, but 

 are urged on by motives of policy. 

 The worker ants clip the wings of 

 their queens. I would say " go to 

 the ant tliou" apiarist, " consider 

 her ways." 



OVERSTOCKING. 



Bt p. H. Elwood. 



The range of the honey bees' 

 flight is limited. The number of 

 honej'-producing flowers within that 

 range is also limited as well as the 

 capacity of the flowers to secrete 

 honey. Granting these assertions, 

 overstocking becomes a possibility. 

 Does this possibility ever become a 

 fact? Let us examine the subject 



