THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



613 



thev do ; not that we claim tliat ours 

 is su|)erior. but we are near a pretty 

 tliickly settled community, only a few 

 miles from Oakland, the second city 

 in the state, and only nine or ten 

 miles from San Francisco. We can 

 get a fair crop of honey any year, 

 while lower down they cannot. We 

 believe that just across the coast range 

 of hills from ns, in Contra Costa 

 county, nianv a tine spot for an ai)iary 

 may be found, and that diirini; a sea- 

 son like the last, fiom tiO to IdO pounds 

 of extracted hcniey percolony roiildbe 

 taken, and that l.W to 200 pouTids could 

 be obtained during a good year. 

 When the craze for white or perfectly 

 clear honey has somewhat died away, 

 we will see the day wlien there will be 

 as mucli lioney raised in the northern 

 portions of the state as there is now 

 produced in the south. Take Shasta 

 and adjoining counties where they 

 have the " small " amount of 9 feet of 

 rain every year— the lower counties 

 hardly had 6 Inches, we believe this 

 year, say a foot anyway— (liere we had 

 only 17 inches)— the flowers grow in 

 remarkable profusion and we have 

 lieard tliat bees do remarkably well 

 tliere. 



People in the east may begin to 

 think tliat California bee-keeping is 

 played out, but they are sadly mis- 

 taken, fpr it is only in its infancy. It 

 is now only conlined toasmall section 

 of the state while in a few years it 

 will extend all over its vast surface— 

 from Del Norte on the north to San 

 Diego on the south and from the Sier- 

 ras on the east to the sea on the west. 

 Then when there will be a sure crop 

 every year, the ipimensity of which 

 was never known before, will the 

 world look for its regular supply of 

 the heavenly distilled sweetness from 

 these shores: then will our apiarists 

 have overcome the niiddlenieii, and 

 then will tlie industry be only second 

 to our wine crop ; aiitl peace and hap- 

 piness be the lot of every ardent 

 keeper of God's grandest insect gift 

 to man. 



!N. Te mescal, Cal. 



VuT the American Reo Joumiil. 



jModern Breeding and Longevity. 



EUGENE SECOU. 



When I came to Northern Iowa, 20 

 years ago, a few of the early settlers 

 kept a few "skeps'" of bee's. They 

 had never heard of a Langstroth hive, 

 nor of an Italian queen bee. The 

 black bee was kept, either in a "log 

 gum." as taken from the woods, or in 

 a rough, unpainted box. made from 

 native lumber. These men had never 

 heard, probably, of putting bees in a 

 cellar or cave, nor of covering them 

 during the winter. At any rate, they 

 did not practice it; yet they survived 

 therigorsof tliose" old-fashioned win- 

 ters."' Not until the Italian bee. and 

 the Langstroth hive were introduced, 

 did we hear of such fatality among 

 the bees. With the introduction of 

 these came also the necessity, or at 

 least the practice, of housing them 

 in winter, until now, no modern bee- 

 keeper is fool-hardy enough to leave 



the hives exposed to the elements 

 while the thermometeris playing hide- 

 and-seek ainoiiR the twenties. 



Many besides myself have un- 

 doubtedly asked themselves the cause 

 of this apparent change. I say ap- 

 parent change. l)ecause it may be 

 that in those early times, when statis- 

 tics relating to this industry were very 

 meager, and l)ee papers almost un- 

 known, that the losses were notnoted. 

 as they are now. And as old bee- 

 keepers nsed to -take up"' all late 

 swarms with new and tender combs, 

 and never counted them as lost, that 

 the per cent, of colonies taken through 

 the winter mav not have been greater 

 than now. "i'et we often hear old 

 men say that " bees didn't use to die 

 so ;" and remembering, as we do, the 

 terrible fatality of 1881, which nearly 

 stripped the entire North of bees, it 

 is worth considering whether or not 

 our modern methods of rearing and 

 keeping bees has anything to do with 

 our losses. 



It is clear to my mind that the Lang- 

 stroth hive is too shallow for out-door 

 wintering in a cold climate. That be- 

 ing true, and in-door wintering, or 

 protection of some kind a necessity, 

 do we comply with the needs of the 

 case as to temperature, dryness, etc.; 

 and if neglecting these, or other 

 essentials, do we not weaken the con- 

 stitution of the race and thereby in- 

 vite disease and death 'f 



Again, the old folks didn't start 

 with one colony in the spring and ex- 

 pect to have ten in the fall. Their in- 

 crease was by natural swarming. Are 

 we not straining nature a little by our 

 rcethods of artilicial increase ":' It is 

 so easy for the novice (and some who 

 are not novices) to divide colonies, and 

 thereby be able to make a big report, 

 that ambition often gets the better of 

 his judgment, and the consequence is 

 that his colonies are constituticmally 

 weak, his queens short-lived, and his 

 real increase and protits small— unless 

 he is in tlie supply business, and can 

 make his customers believe that 

 queens reared by the forcing process 

 are just as desirable as those reared in 

 full colonies, in the natural way, and 

 in the proper season. 



That high breeding— that is, breed- 

 ing for certain characteristics not 

 found in the native races— is opjiosed 

 to longevity Is proven by the history 

 of our own race, and by the experi- 

 ence and observation of breeders of 

 thoroughbreds and higli grades among 

 our domestic animals, and I see no 

 reason that the rule will not hold good 

 in insect life. If we breed for beauty 

 of form or color, or for early maturity, 

 or any other special trait and neglect 

 to comjilv with certain laws tending 

 to other" and perhaps as important 

 characteristics, such breeding will 

 often be at the exi)ense of the hardi- 

 ness of tlie race and prove in the end 

 (lisastrous. 



Breed for color if you like, but do 

 not neglect better traits. If it is 

 beauty you want, remember "hand- 

 some is that handsome does." Breed 

 for large bees if you wish— bees that 

 liave a proboscis like a rye straw— that 

 can suck syrup from the bottom of a 

 molasses- barrel— but in so doing do 



not make them so tender that we will 

 have to rai.se the queen " on the bot- 

 tle." nor take the workers to bed with 

 us to nurse them through the winter. 



If Vogel iscorrectin his theory, that 

 the Italians are not a pure race, may 

 not some of these losses be traced to 

 that cause, for, if not pure, crossing 

 with the black bee. instead of adding 

 vigor to the latter Would make them 

 less hardy than either ? For instance : 

 my neighbors who were most unfortu- 

 nate in losses in 1881, are men who 

 have not infused any fresh blood into 

 their apiaries for several years. My 

 own, that stood the test better than 

 any of them, ha 1 been improved every 

 year by the addition of queens from 

 abroad. 



Now, the lesson which I wish to 

 deduce from this is. that the cross of 

 the Italians and black bees, to be 

 beneficial, must be kept up, otherwise 

 our bees degenerate to a condition 

 worse than before the intermingling 

 of the tvio. 



The imp<ntance of thoroughbred 

 drones is beginning to be appreciated. 

 If a low grade bull is not tit to breed 

 from, why is a hybrid drone, the 

 tendency of whose offspring is to re- 

 vert to the original type V 



Forest City, Iowa." 



Translated by A. R. Kolinke. 



Two Queens in One Hive. 



JOnANN FELSWANN. 



" Two queens in one hive is nothing 

 new," says one; "it has happened 

 with me, too." Certainly, such cases 

 are not so very rare, and will be ob- 

 served by every attentive bee-keeper, 

 and if I essay to write about it, it is 

 not so much on account of the two 

 queens as on account of the accom- 

 panying circumstances. u"der which 

 they were observed. No practical ex- 

 perienced apiarist will deny the exist- 

 ence of two queens in one hive occa- 

 sionally, but the opinions as to the 

 " why "'" of it. diverge very much. To 

 enumerate all the different opinions 

 of bee-keepers with reference to this 

 subject would till many pages, the 

 study of which would lead to the con- 

 clusion that the occurrence of two 

 fertile queens in one hive has not yet 

 been sutlicieutly explained, and will 

 remain so until by experiment the 

 conditions are discovered under which 

 an otherwise normal colony will suffer 

 two queens in their hive. 



Now. as to mv case : It was on an 

 afternoon in .Inly, the day being very 

 clear and bright ; as it had rained the 

 preceding night, everything was re- 

 freshed and the bees improved the 

 opportnnitv to gather honey from the 

 newly opened tlowers. I had one very 

 populous colony, which, in spite of all 

 the chances there were, did not swarm; 

 hence, on the day spoken of above I 

 went to investigate the case. On re- 

 moving the frames. I found in the 

 (irst three newly-gathered honey, the 

 fourth was one-third honey and the 

 rest empty cells, cleaned and polished 

 to receive eggs, which fact led me to 

 suppose the queen near. Very care- 

 fully I removed the frame, and there 



