Jm AMERICAN 



* * * 



ApfcULTURIST. 



A Journal Devoted, to Practical Beekeeping. 



VOL. X. 



AUGUST, 1892. 



No. 8. 



YELLOW-BANDED BEES IN CARNI- 

 OLA. 



Editor of Am. Apiculturist : — In re- 

 ply to your inquiry of recent date I 

 would say that the quotations attributed 

 to me on page 80 of the Am. Apicul- 

 turist for May, 1892, taken from the 

 British Bee Journal 2CiQ from articles I 

 wrote, and, though in themselves cor- 

 rect, they convey, without further quo- 

 tation from the same article, or others 

 of mine published about the same time, 

 quite erroneous impressions as to my 

 views regarding yellow bands on Carni- 

 olan bees. Whoever has quoted my 

 statement concerning the prevalence in 

 Carniola of bees showing more or less 

 yellow, evidently did not wish to have my 

 explanation of this occurrence known. 

 Nor would I like to have those who 

 read the extract from the British Bee 

 Journal conclude, because I quoted 

 what had been said to me by "two in- 

 telligent beekeepers from Upper Carni- 

 ola," that I necessarily subscribe to their 

 views. These two beekeepers (the 

 brothers Jeglic) say "that orange or 

 rusty red bands are not a mark of im- 

 purity in Carniolans." But I thought 

 then, and still think, that they are a de- 

 cided fnark of impurity. It would be 

 but fair, after what you have published in 

 connection with my name, to insert, also, 

 my explanation of how it is that "there 

 is in the Carniolan race a tinge of yel- 

 low blood that crops out every now and 

 then, do the best one may." 



First, let me say that I regard Carni- 

 olans as a distinct and very well estab- 



lished type — one of the dark races, and 

 neither the history of beekeeping in 

 Carniola, nor my observations while 

 travelling and residing there and breed- 

 ing Carniolans extensively, would lead 

 me to think that pure Carniolans were 

 other than dark colored bees — distin- 

 guished from common brown bees by a 

 gray pubescence, which gives a dark 

 ashy appearance. 



The style of beekeeping now followed 

 in Carniola has long been the same, as 

 can be learned from the writings of 

 Janscha, a Carniolan beekeeper who 

 taught apiculture in Vienna under com- 

 mission from the Austrian crown, and 

 whose work was published in 1775, also 

 from those of von Ehrenfels, fJaron 

 Rothschuetz and others. Migratory bee- 

 keeping is followed to such an extent 

 that all hives are arranged for it, being 

 long, shallow boxes (12 to 14 inches 

 wide, 6 to 8 inches high, and about 30 

 inches long) , which can be easily and 

 quickly piled one upon another and 

 side by side to the number of 60 to 75 

 on a long wagon, whose body is swung 

 by hooks attached to the four wagon 

 stakes. Whole apiaries, consisting of 

 several hundred hives, are thus trans- 

 ported to distant pastures in one or two 

 nights. Sometimes the railway lines 

 are used, and I have seen a "bee-train," 

 mainly of flat cars, bearing some 5,000 

 colonies of bees from the northern val- 

 ley of the Carnic Alps to the central 

 plains, where the fields are white with 

 buckwheat in August and September. 

 Every year beekeepers come from south- 

 (117) 



