THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



179 



discovered bees having white 

 bands, bnt he did not at that time 

 succeed in producing bees all of 

 which showed tliese ^marlcings. 

 The honor of producing the first 

 pure Albinos, I think, belongs to 

 Mr. Valentine. 



In a letter received from him a 

 short time since, he writes : '^Tlie 

 Albino bees have bred up from the 

 Italians. You know that all lead- 

 ing beekeepers agree that the Ital- 

 ians are not a pure race. In the 

 Italians we have some verj^j-ellow 

 and rather small, others very 

 bright but larger ; also we have 

 the dark and leather-colored ones. 

 We find in the larger and better 

 marked ones, some of the peculi- 

 arities of the Albino, and I never 

 saw these traits in a low grade of 

 Italian. I first produced the Al- 

 bino by a series of cross-breed- 

 ing." 



Now will not the readers of the 

 " Api" give us the benefit of their 

 experience with the Albino and 

 let us hear all that we can about 

 them before we condemn them to 

 " utter oblivion." 



Fittsjield, Mass. 



[We have nothing to retract regarding 

 what was said concerning Albino bees. Tliis 

 spring we parcliase<l eighteen colonies of 

 bees, and among the lot were ten col6nies of 

 the Albino The person of whom we pur- 

 cliased the bees sold them because he could 

 get no suri)lus honey. They were used by 

 us for nuclei colonies and all have now nearly 

 died out bnt two or three colonies which we 

 kept to further test the working qualities of 

 this peculiar strain of the Italian. Not one 

 of these colonies have made an ounce of sec- 

 tion honey, nor did they fill the comb in the 

 brood-chamber as full of stores as did other 

 colonies in the same apiary that were very 

 much less populous. Some of the Albino 

 •■olonies had a peck of Ix'es in them, as the 

 queens were very prolific, but stored no 

 lioney. The nucleus colonies formed of tlie 

 Albino bees did not gather honey enough to 

 keep them from day to day, and were the 

 first colonies we had to I'eed iu order to keep 

 them from "swarming out." 



We would like to have our correspondent 

 answer this question : " How did Mr. Valen- 

 tine keep these Albino bees pure except by 

 inbreeding?" There wasnothing in the "bee- 

 line" to cross them with. Unless inbreeding 

 is practised, the purity and beauty of the 

 Albino strain will soon deteriorate. How 

 otherwise can these two unimportant qualities 

 be preserved ? 



We wish to remind our friend that Mr. D. 



A. Pike, of Smithburg, Maryland, was the 

 first iierson to develop the Albino bee in all 

 its puiity and beauty, and to him belongs the 

 credit for the same. 



Wc are raising no Albino queens at the 

 " Api" bee farm, and shall not again do so. — 

 Eu.l 



For the American ApicuUurist. 



HOW TO MAKE A CHEAP 

 SMOKER. 



By Ciias. a. Houghton. 



I keep only a few colonies of 

 bees and have used a smoker of 

 my own invention which may be 

 of service to some. For twenty 

 cents, I bought an " insect powder 

 gun" (sold commonly at the stores 

 for blowing insect powder around a 

 room), which is simply a round tin 

 box, one side of which is a spring 

 bellows and in the opposite side a 

 hole for introducing the powder. 

 I then took a round tin box 1;^ 

 inches diameter, 1^- inches high, 

 removed the cover, cut a hole in 

 the bottom and placing this hole 

 over the hole in the " insect gun " 

 soldered the bottom of the box 

 firmly to the side of the gun. I 

 then stopped the little tube pro- 

 jecting from the gun with cotton 

 and my bellows was ready. 



To make a smoker, I take cotton 

 rags and wind them around a stick 

 one-fourth inch diameter, winding 

 it large enough so that one end of 

 smoker will just fit snugly in the 

 tin-box on the side of gun. I then 

 wind a small wire around it, fit it 

 in the box and withdraw the stick 

 which leaves a small aperture 

 through the smoker through which 

 air and smoke are drawn in to the 

 gun and blown out again by means 

 of the bellows. Make the smoker 

 three or four inches long. The 

 same wire can be used many times. 



Instead of rags I have of late 

 used green moss which j^ou find 

 plentifully in wet woods. I wind 



