June 29, 1899. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



403 



The Nectar in Flowep-Cups— Pure Italians. 



BY A. NORTON. 



1 HARDLY think that any, or at most many, will attach 

 much weig-ht or importance to the idea that nectar in 

 flower-cups varies in strenffth and quality accordinr;; to 

 layers in the same blossom, and that different lengths of 

 tongue in different bees will make a resulting difference in 

 the character of honey they might gather from the same 

 flowers. This has nothing to do with the question of the 

 ability of bees with longer tongues to gather honey from 

 species of flowers where those with shorter tongues could 

 not reach it. In this latter case the longer-tongued bees 

 would gather more honey and better, providing the flowers 

 in question produced a better kind. 



But the other idea seems to me very far-fetcht, and 

 without any disrespect toward any who have brought it for- 

 ward, it seems to me hardly worthy of serious discussion. 

 But I wish to look it over briefly. 



In the first place, the nectar as secreted originally by 

 the flower is a uniform product — it is alread)' a sweetened 

 liquid, not clear water and solid or thickened sweet. Hence 

 it is exuded into the flower-cup as a homogeneous mass — all 

 alike. In the second place, it is not composed of incompati- 

 ble substances, as, for example, the cream and the water in 

 milk, or as the lime and water in whitewash, or as paint in 

 oil. On the contrary, the substances have the greatest 

 aflin'ity for each other (I do not mean chemical affinity, but 

 molecular attraction or affinity). 



Hence, the cream in milk is in a state of suspension : 

 and, being lighter than water, rises to the top ; while the 

 lime in whitewash and the paint in oil are also merely sus- 

 pended therein, but being heavier tend to settle to the bot- 

 tom. But the sweet in nectar is in a state of solution, and 

 is held everywhere disperst thru the water by molecular 

 attraction. If you put solid sugar at the bottom of a glass 

 ■of water and give it time enough, the sugar will gradually 

 be dissolved and carried thruout the water ; this will occur 

 •even if the sugar be tied up in a bladder or other porous 

 membrane. And there will in time be no heavier or sweeter 

 layer at the bottom, unless tlie sugar be in excess of the sat- 

 uration point, ivhich is not tlie ease in the thin neetar of 

 Jloivers. Hence the tendency of sweet in water is toward 

 diffusion, and not toward accretion, until the saturation 

 point is reacht. The same is true of salt and other soluble 

 substances. Did any one ever hear it claimed that sap was 

 sweeter in the bottom of the pail ? Was it ever claimed that 

 the honey was sweeter in the lower portions of the cells in 

 the comb, or, if extracted, in the bottom of the can ? Tliis 

 Tvould be more likely on account of the greater proportion 

 ■of sweet in solution than in the case of nectar. 



Mineral springs are constantly depositing lime, silica, 

 etc., in all conditions of the water, and wherever the water 

 flows from them, for these substances are only in suspeti- 

 sion. But the inland lakes of California and Nevada do not 

 deposit salt, soda and borax until evaporated down to the 

 saturation point ; and, as the saturation points of these 

 substances differ, they are not all deposited together, but in 

 more or less defined layers, so that in dry lake-beds these 

 ■deposits are reacht in regular succession by digging. 



And, finally, if the sweet of nectar would settle (whicli 

 it does not) the largest drop of honey produced by any 

 flower would be too small for any difference to be noticed. 



QUESTION FOR MR. DOOLITTLE ON PURE ITALIANS. 



In closing I wish to ask a question of Mr. Doolittle, who 

 I think is about right. (See page 306.) But if the Ital- 

 ian bee is not a pure race, and if this is shown by the in- 

 ■creast amount of yellow that has been bred into some 

 strains, then should not some pure stock exist with still 

 more yellow than the yellowest bred Italians? All crosses 

 are between the two pure types that produce them. Where 

 is any race found of nearly pure yellow bees ? And. espe- 

 cially, where are such near enough to Italy to have served 

 the purpose of crossing with blacks to produce the common 

 Italian bee ? Monterey Co., Calif. 



Making' Increase by Dividing- Feeding' Bees. 



BY C. P. D.AD.^NT. 



IN a previous article I stated that it was our method to 

 take the increase in bees, when any is wanted, from col- 

 onies that are not expected to store much surplus. Our 

 reason for doing this is that we have always noticed^and 

 all who have had extensive experience in the apiary will 



sustain us in this — that it is the strongest and best colonies 

 from which the real honey crop may be expected. If such 

 colonies may be induced to work freely in the surplus in- 

 stead of swarming, and we succeed in this by our methods 

 inmost cases, these colonies maybe depended upon for a 

 crop far in excess of what the colonies under average would 

 yield. The prolificness of the queen may not be the sole 

 cause of the difference. We believe that the greatest cause 

 of the difference in yield is the earliness or lateness of the 

 breeding; the earlj' colonies having the bulk of their bees 

 ready for the harvest, while the late ones have them ready 

 too late, as mentioned by me in a previous article. 



But aside from these causes, it is probable also that 

 there is a difference between colonies in the activity of 

 their bees as there is in men. some being more industrious 

 or better managers than others. For this reason, altho we 

 want the increase from the late and comparativeU' inferior 

 colonies, we must not get our breed from them, fi>r it is 

 also of the utmost importance that our queens should be of 

 the very best quality, that is, bred from the most prolific 

 mothers, and of a race of active workers. In a word, we 

 must do with our bees, as much as in our power, what we 

 do with our horses, our cows, our chickens, and our pigs — 

 breed from the best, the gentlest, the most serviceable all 

 around. 



To do this and )-et keep our best colonies at work pro- 

 ducing honey, all that is necessary is to rear our queens 

 from select colonies, taking from them, or rather exchang- 

 ing from them, as much brood as is necessary for our pur- 

 pose. 



It is not in the scope of this article to give instructions 

 on the rearing of queens or on the making of nuclei, suffice 

 it to say that we must rear, in nuclei or otherwise, as many 

 young queens as our swarms will need. These queens may 

 be introduced while yet in the cell to the divided colonies. 



When we say that we take our increase from inferior 

 colonies, we do not wish it understood that we take it from 

 weak colonies. A colony which has not filled most of its 

 combs with brood by the middle of June, is not to be ex- 

 pected to furnish any increase. What we mean to say is, 

 that when the harvest has begun fairly, we take the in- 

 crea.se from those colonies which, altho apparently strong, 

 do not work in the supers. The weak colonies would bet- 

 ter be let alone, and if their queens are at fault, perhaps they 

 would better be replaced, and it is quite likely that some of 

 our young artificial swarms will soon prove superior to such 

 colonies. 



We proceed as follows : Selecting the colony which is 

 to furnish us the larva; for our young queens, we exchange 

 a number of its brOod-combs. those containing young brood, 

 for the same number of brood-combs of an inferior colony, 

 without the bees, taking care to leave in the latter hive only 

 such brood as has been furnisht by the selected colony, for if 

 we left them any of their own brood, thej- might rear queens 

 from this perhaps in preference to the other. As a matter 

 of course, the queen of this hive is removed, either to be 

 killed or given to a queeiiless colony, or exchanged for a 

 still poorer queen in another hive. 



The now queenless colon)' goes to building queen-cells 

 from this selected brood. On the ninth day after the opera- 

 tion we are ready to make as many swarms as there are 

 queen-cells but one, since one is needed for the colony that 

 reared them. 



We now go to our colonies from which we desire the in- 

 crease, find the queen of each and remove her to a new 

 stand with half of the brood-combs, more or less, according- 

 to circumstances, and a goodly number of young bees, 

 enough at least to keep the brood warm. It must be remem- 

 bered that as this colony, or rather this, swarm, gets hone 

 of the old bees, it needs a rather larger number of j-oung- 

 bees than would appear necessary in order to take care of 

 the brood. 



On the tenth day, or the day following this operation, 

 we give each of our queenless divisions a queen-cell, 

 grafted on the combs in the usual way. These hives should 

 as much as possible be supplied with empty comb, or full 

 sheets of foundation, as their bees will build nothing but 

 drone-comb until the young queen is laying, which will re- 

 quire from 6 to 15 days. This is important to remember. 

 On the other hand, the hive containing the queen may be 

 depended upon to build mainly worker-comb in its empty 

 frames, as their numbers are diminisht, and there is but 

 little inducement to the building of drone-comb in any 

 other than a queenless or a wealthy colony. The queenless 

 colony builds drone-comb because there is an instinctive 

 feeling that drones are needed to fertilize the young queen 

 when hatcht, and the wealthy colony builds drone-comb be- 



