626 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



For tbe American Boo Journal. 



THE NATIQNAIJONVENTION. 



President Cook's Address. 



[This and the five following ad- 

 dresses will be read and discussed at 

 the National Convention, to be held 

 at Cincinnati, 0., commencing Oct. 

 3, 1882— Ed.] 



Experiments with Bees. 



There are several piiints in the hab- 

 its and economy of bees, concerning 

 which scientists and practical bee- 

 keepers are not all .agreed. Some of 

 these are not witliont practical im- 

 portance. In the researches and ex- 

 periments which I now describe, I 

 have aimed to settle delinitely some 

 of these mo<ited questions. 



Bees Voiding Dry Feces. 



The late M. Quinby, who, as a 

 practical bee-keeper, had few if any 

 superiors in our country, taught dur- 

 ing the latter part of his life, that 

 bees to winter well required heat to 

 evaporate the moisture from their 

 feces, which in healtli would be passed 

 in a dry state in the hive. Last win- 

 ter in "an article in the Rural New 

 Yorker. 1 called this theory in ques- 

 tion, stating that I had yet to find evi- 

 dence thai it was correct. Mr. !N. N. 

 Betsiiiger in an article before the N. 

 E. Bee-Keeper's Association at its 

 last meeting said : " The atTnosphere 

 outside the cluster should not fall 

 much below 60-; and with these con- 

 ditions the excrement will be dis- 

 charged in a dry state." Mr. E. Gal- 

 lup, in Okuninlis in Bee-Ctdlure, May, 

 1882, p. 233, says that he has ''often 

 seen bees disdiarge t!ie contents of 

 their abdomens, which was powdery- 

 like,'' though this was not in the hive 

 but as the bee flew forth on the snow, 

 and was about to die. Mr. C. N. Ab- 

 bott, editor of the British Bee Journal, 

 says that he is "amused that there 

 should be any uncertainty in this mat- 

 ter." lie says that " if bees are sent 

 some miles on the cars, where they 

 have room to fly in the box, any one 

 may see the dry excreta." He has 

 "seen hundreds of cases where there 

 have been thousands of grains of bee 

 excreta, about the size and color of 

 coarse gun powder." 



Lastly I quote the noted agricul- 

 tural editor of the Province of On- 

 tario. Mr. W. E. Clarke, who Is 

 " quite certain that bees void dry 

 feces." He says in the Ajierican 

 Bee Journal, vol. 18 p. 374, "when 

 we have discovered the conditions 

 under which bees discharge dry feces 

 only, we shall have solved the problem 

 of successfal wintering." 



To ascertain the truth in this mat- 

 ter, I Hrst examined the alimentary 

 canals of scores of bees which were 

 taken from the hives in the cellar, just 

 before setting them out in the spring. 

 These bees had wintered exceptionalfy 

 well, and if Mr. yuiuhy was correct. 

 were just the ones to show the dry 

 feces. According to Messrs. Gallup 

 and Betsinger, these bees should hold 



in their intestines the dry excrement. 

 In every case I found no sign of the 

 dry powder, but the semi-liquid mass, 

 containing grains, probably pollen, 

 which I have ever found in such dis- 

 sections. The intestinal excreta of 

 bees I find to be very much tlie same 

 at ail times ; the principal difference 

 being in the number and size of gran- 

 ules and in some cases a more rank 

 odor. 



1 next took all the material that was 

 on the bottom board of a colony which 

 had wintered so w'ell that there were 

 very few dead bees in the hive, to Dr. 

 Kedzie, and asked him to report the 

 character of the contents. The re- 

 sult of the analysis gave 7.5 per cent. 

 wax, the remainderconsisting of sand, 

 and parts of dead bees. Prof. Beal 

 and I gave the same material a care- 

 ful niicro,scopic examination, and 

 though we found the powder-like 

 grains, referred to by Mr. Abbott, 

 their character was not such as the 

 appearance of the feces would lead us 

 to expect, in case they were fecal 

 masses. 1 examined these very care- 

 fully, and in almost every one l" found 

 conipound hairs, just such as are found 

 on the bodies of bees, and wliich I 

 have never found in tlie intestines of 

 bees. In some cases I did tind that 

 there was considerable matter that did 

 not melt as does wax, and whicli 

 seemed to contain pollen, but the form 

 of these masses, and tlie fact that 

 hairs were einliodied in them, leads 

 me to conclude that tliey originated in 

 the same way that the similarly 

 formed wax pellets did, with whicli 

 they were associated, and of which 

 they often formed a part. Where the 

 bees had wintered well, and there was 

 no sign of dysentery, there was not 

 the least fecal odor to this mass on the 

 bottom board beneath tlie bees. After 

 a full examination, I became so 

 thoroughly convinced that this mass 

 was not at all fecal in its origin, that 

 I put large bunches of it into my 

 mouth and chewed them, to find in 

 every case a nearly tasteless, wax- 

 like gritty substance, with no possible 

 taste to iiint of a fecal origin. The 

 grit is easily accounted for as sand 

 will blow into the entrance of the 

 hives in the autumn. Prof. Beal and 

 I saw these sand-grains with the 

 microscope, and Dr. Kedzie met the 

 same in his examination. 



Summer Experiments. 



During the months of June and 

 July last, I experimented with three 

 different colonies of bees, at three 

 different times, as follows : I shut 

 them in, so that they could not fly, and 

 gave them clean hives, well ventilated 

 with nothing in them but the empty 

 frames, though in one case I added 

 foundation. The bees were left in 

 this condition for two or three weeks, 

 and each colony fed daily from one to 

 three pounds of the best granulated 

 sugar, reduced to a syrup by adding 

 8 lbs. of water to 10 lbs. of the sugar. 

 The hives were empty of combs, save 

 as t e bees built them, and so the bees 

 had a chance to fly in the hive, and in 

 the middle of the day, as the heat 

 would become great, they would lie 

 irritated very miich like they would if 



carried on a journey. The hives were' 

 covered with wire gaiuze which was 

 painted green. At the close of the 

 experiment in each case the bottom- 

 board was covered with the powder- 

 like grains, which all of my large 

 class of students pronounced at once 

 to be the droppings of the bees. There 

 is no wonder that the gentlemen above 

 referred to have been deceived. To 

 one acquainted with fly specks, there 

 would be no doubt in regard to their 

 nature, until he gave the subject close 

 scientific examination. All of these 

 masses contain wax, bee-hairs, and 

 many of pieces of wood, quite large 

 grains of green paint which they had 

 cut from the wire gauze, some of 

 wliich were semi-cylindrical; and in- 

 one ease where there was a piece of 

 cotton cloth in the hive, long cotton 

 fibers. Some of the wood splinters 

 were still attached to the hive, and 

 yet surrounded with the pellets, the 

 hairs winding around the wood. In 

 all of these cases the entrances to the 

 hives were closed with common wire 

 gauze, and in every case there was a 

 small windrow of these pellets just 

 outside the gauze. 



Now that these were any of them 

 fecal pellets, notwithstanding their 

 appearance, is entirely disproved. 

 Careful dissection of scores of bees 

 found the same semi-liquid mass re- 

 ferred to above, thick with pollen 

 grains, which in one case Prof. Beal 

 identified as pollen grains of the pine, 

 with no sign of bee hairs, paint par- 

 ticles, or wood splinte-rs. Secondly, 

 many of these jiellets had incorpo- 

 rated in them cotton fibers, wood 

 splinters, and paint masses that could 

 not have gone through the intestinal 

 canal of the liees. Thirdly, the bees 

 could not possibly have discharged 

 their feces outside the entrance, 

 through the wire gauze, as seen in the 

 little windrows. Lastly, it the masses, 

 which embraced the wootl-splinters,, 

 passed through the bees, the slivers 

 must have done so as well, but these 

 were attached to the hive, by one end, 

 and so if they passed through the ali- 

 mentary canal of the bees the hive 

 must have borne them company; 

 which, notwithstanding the great 

 achievments of bees, will hardly be 

 credited even by the most credulous. 

 I am much indel)ted to Prof. W. J. 

 Beal and one of my students, Mr. W. 

 M. Badcock, a very careful and pains- 

 taking young man, both of whom have 

 given this subject careful investiga- 

 tion, and feel certain that the masses 

 cannot be fecal. 



I will further state that in a fevf 

 cases I found real feces in the hive. 

 These, consisting of dried pollen 

 grains, were strung out in a row, and 

 ni every case there was a stain by the 

 side of the mass, indicating their 

 original semi-liquid condition in which 

 the fresh feces are ever found. These 

 masses were like the intestiual excre- 

 ment, and not at all like the so-called 

 fecal masses described above. There 

 is no doubt but that bees, if long con- 

 fined in their hives are irritated, 

 either by ton great cold or too great 

 heat, or continual disturbance as by 

 jarring, will have to void their feces, 

 and, ill they cannot fly out, they will 



