276 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Apr. 1 



brood bill if you haven't already done so, 

 unless you can do as I did, button-hole 

 your man when he is at home and get him 

 to promise the right thing. [Yes, yes ! No 

 bill can be passed unless the representa- 

 tives can be made to feel that their constit- 

 uents want the measure. Besides bee- 

 keepers writing themselves, they should go 

 to influential men and politicians in their 

 vicinity, and get them to write to their Sen- 

 ators or Representatives, or both. One 

 who has a little "political pull" will have 

 ten times as much influence as one who has 

 little or nothing to do with politics. — Ed.] 



G. C. Greiner is a practical sort of man, 

 but I couldn't puzzle out how he moves 40 

 per cent (not 4 per cent, as the types make 

 it) of his hives in straight rows so as to get 

 them in close rows of five each, although I 

 worked on it for some time with pieces of 

 paper numbered. Then when I got to the 

 footnote I was as badly puzzled to under- 

 stand how the editor could easily get his 

 group of five hives into a straight row. But 

 there is this probable dift'erence in the two 

 cases: Friend Greiner has done his (even 

 if I can't), and the editor has never tried 

 his. [Why not have a group of five hives 

 in a row if you want them? What is to 

 hinder? You can have five in a straight 

 row in a group as easily as you can have 

 three. Yes, I have tried the plan outlined. 

 You must have got a wrong idea in your 

 head some way. — Ed.] 



Ye editor explains, p. 244, how 75 cts. 

 per colony is cleaned up by having shallow 

 frames and feeding sugar at the close of 

 the season. I wish H. R. Boardman would 

 tell us whether he can or can not clean up as 

 much with deeper frames and feeding sugar 

 before the beginning of the season. [But you 

 are introducing a new condition. I was 

 not talking about feeding before the har- 

 vest, but of the relative difference between 

 deep and shallow frames, both sets of frames 

 to be treated exactly alike, except in the 

 matter of feeding afterward. Any colony 

 on deep or shallow frames will produce 

 more comb honey, especially if the season 

 be short, if the brood-nest is filled with 

 sugar syrup so that new honey, when it 

 does come in, will have to go into the supers 

 direct. If we are going to make compara- 

 tive tests, the conditions under which each 

 one is made should be exactly the same 

 prior to the harvest. — Ed.] 



WiLMON Newell has blazed a new track 

 by coming out plainly on p. 241 and con- 

 demning that nonsense about an umbilical 

 cord in queen-cells. I don't know whether 

 our scientific men think it beneath their 

 dignity, or whether they're afraid of get- 

 ting into trouble by it, but it seems to be a 

 rule with them never to say a word against 

 any glaring error, unless it comes from 

 some other scientist. Rev. W. F. Clarke 

 said bees dropped poison from their stings 

 into honey, and used their stings as trow- 

 els to work wax, and I don't remember see- 

 ing a word against it from any scientist. 



Prof. McLean said he fertilized queens by 

 hand, and no one had the backbone to chal- 

 lenge the statement. So I take off my hat 

 to the Texan entomologist. But when he 

 says he strongly suspects that Dr. Gallup 

 has discovered a food-carrying tube, I sup- 

 pose it may be permitted one of the laity to 

 strongly suspect that nothing at all has 

 been discovered that was not known before. 

 [Mr. Newell is the right man in the right 

 place. He is one from whom we shall hear 

 more later. Besides having a scientific 

 training, he is intensely interested in bees. 

 Ed.] 



YotiR PLAN of stealing a march on an 

 obstreperous colony, Mr. Editor, p. 241, by 

 grafting their queen-cells with choice lar- 

 va?, is good. You may save a week's time 

 over that plan if you happen to have a 

 young queen just hatched. Here's what I 

 think is true: A young queen just out of 

 the cell, if she has not been imprisoned in 

 the cell by the bees, will be kindly received 

 in any colony, no matter whether it has a 

 laying queen, laying workers, or what not. 

 If the colony has a satisfactory queen, this 

 young queen will be killed as soon as she 

 is old enough, perhaps when a day or so 

 old; but in all other cases she will assume 

 control. [I know a young queen just hatch- 

 ed will be more readily accepted than one 

 a few hours old; and when introducing vir- 

 gins we also prefer to have them when 

 they are downy, young, and somewhat fee- 

 ble. They then seem to elicit the sympa- 

 thy of the bees, which immediately go to 

 caressing. But, doctor, if I remember cor- 

 rectl}', I tried to give to the obstreperous 

 colony to which I referred a young virgin 

 as well as cells. But they had their dan- 

 der up, and proposed to do things in their 

 own way. The handling of the virgin pos- 

 sibly gave the scent of a human being to 

 her, and that was sufficient reason to kill 

 her, and they did instanter. — Ed.] 



You SAY, Mr. Editor, p. 224, you have 

 seen stings lodged in the body of a balled 

 queen. Yes, you have seen a queen stung 

 to death that had been in a ball. But did 

 you ever see a queen stung zvhile she was 

 in the ball? I don't know, but I think a 

 queen is never stung while she is in the 

 ball, and I much doubt the physical possi- 

 bility of such a thing. If the bees sting 

 a queen while in a ball, why should they 

 leave her unstung an hour or more before 

 giving her the fatal stab? Did you ever 

 know a queen to be stung in a ball if the 

 ball was thrown into cold water? Weren't 

 the cases in which you saw the queen stung 

 those in which you poked or smoked the 

 bees away from the queen enough so that 

 one of them could sting her? Left entirely 

 to themselves, do 3'ou believe the bees could 

 sting a balled queen if they would ? Do 

 you believe they would if they could ? In a 

 case in which you have not found the balled 

 queen till she was dead, did you ever find 

 that such a queen had been stung? Your 

 reasoning as to the improbability of a 



