1903 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



389 



pense would be involved. Many may try 

 it this summer. 



Now as to my experiment. Lack of time 

 was the trouble with me. I could not watch 

 the tent as closelj' as I should like to. In 

 these cases the g-overnment should step in; 

 and let us hope that the Department of 

 Ag'riculture at Washing-ton will receive at 

 least S20,000 a year to carry on investig^a- 

 tions. You will notice I attributed my fail- 

 ure to the nuclei with queens being- between 

 the tent and the larg-e apiary, the noise of fly- 

 ing bees and drones drawings them to the per- 

 forated-metal entrance. By putting- the nu- 

 clei on the other side of the fertilizing--tent 

 the position in this respect would be re- 

 versed. This point I saw before last season 

 closed; but my large buckwhat harvest pre- 

 vented undertaking any more at the time. 



At Syracuse Mr. F. H. Cyrenius, Oswe- 

 go, stated he thought he could help me in 

 preventing the queen from trying to get 

 through the entrance through which the 

 bees were flying, and kindly invited me to 

 Oswego. Gladly availing myself of the in- 

 vitation, to Oswego I went. He for another 

 purpose shades this entrance through which 

 worker bees fly, and throws all the light he 

 can on the entrance to which he wishes to 

 invite the queen. Now, I did not do this; 

 in fact, the queen had not only to pass 

 through a Js-inch-wide hole in a ^-inch- 

 thick board at the rear of the nucleus, but 

 through a hole of similar width in a J/s-inch- 

 thick board fence. 



In the above I have given every thought I 

 have upon the reason of my failure, and the 

 remedy. It is, perhaps, with a little re- 

 luctance; but having gone so far, it is only 

 natural to desire to crown the effort with 

 success. Yet I hope many will try these 

 experiments. Many can try the first and 

 second, and a few the larger. All I ask is 

 that, as success crowns the effort, it shall 

 be reported in Gleanings. Of course, 

 should Prof. Benton tr3' these experiments 

 it will have to be published through the 

 regular channels. 



Brantford, Ont. 



[These reports are interesting and valu- 

 able; but the}' are so contrar}' to the ex- 

 perience of others that we are almost in- 

 clined to put an interrogation-mark after 

 them. Is it possible that Mr. Rowsome, 

 Mr. Inksetter, and Mr. Comstock could 

 each have been mistaken in what each saw 

 or thought he saw? Did fertilization ac- 

 tually take place in the carboy, or some- 

 thing which looked ver^' much like it? The 

 expeiience of Mr. Comstock seems to leave 

 no doubt, if he is a man of veracity and 

 experience, that the queen taken from the 

 cell was actually fertilized by the dead 

 drone found in the cage with her. The fact 

 that there were eggs in the comb that she 

 herself laid, and that these same eggs de- 

 veloped worker bees, seems to indicate that 

 edition had actually taken place; but even 

 if it had, I should be more inclined to think 

 that the general rule, that queens must be 



fertilized in the open air, still holds true. 

 Nature sometimes makes a deviation from 

 the general laws laid down for her; and it 

 is possible that she did so in the case re- 

 ported. If so, it would be a new fact to us 

 that queens may be fertilized in confine- 

 ment in rare instances; and it is possible 

 that there are conditions under which fer- 

 tilization could be made a success when both 

 the drone and the queen are confined. 

 There is food for thought here, and an op- 

 portunity for experiment; and with Mr. 

 Holtermann I sincerely hope the United 

 States Government can at some time, if not 

 in the immediate future, conduct some ex- 

 periments that will give us a little light 

 on this question. As it is, I commend this 

 article to the consideration of Prof. Frank 

 Benton, at Washington, and Mr. William 

 Newell, of College Station, Texas, and oth- 

 er stations where apicultural experiments 

 are being conducted, — Ed.] 



QUEENS WITH DENTED SIDES; A QUEEN 



THAT WAS CONDEMNED, BUT PROVED 



TO BE ALL RIGHT FOR HONEY. 



Last summer I bought seven of your 

 red-clover queens. One of them got hurt in 

 some way in the mail. She had a small 

 dent in her body, just below the waist. Mr. 

 J. Zay advised me to send her back by re- 

 turn mail. But I thought I would try my 

 luck. I had a very large colony of blacks, 

 and put her in with them. Last Tuesday, 

 March 17, I looked all my bees over, and 

 found her still alive; but her body is all 

 turned to one side. There is no brood nor 

 any eggs. The other six are full of yellow 

 bees. 



Mr. Zay bought one red-clover queen of 

 The A. I. Root Co. She was dark, and 

 her bees still darker. He called them good 

 for nothing, and was going to replace her 

 with a golden queen, and he gave the Root 

 queen to me. I caught a swarm of black 

 bees on the 4th of July, and put the Root 

 queen in on the 6th, and took 42 nice sec- 

 tions of red-clover hone3'from the Rootqueen. 



Now, Mr. Editor, you and I do not agree 

 on finding no brood within two inches of 

 the Hofl'man-frame top-bar. I have Root 

 chaft" hives, Hoftman frames. Hill device, 

 and a five-inch cushion on top, and they 

 have brood right up to the top-bar. My 

 single Dovetailed hive has a little brood 

 down in the center. In spring it's too cold 

 to rest on a top-bar, and in summer it is too 

 hot. Bees, as a rule, will select the safest 

 part of their hive for their brood. I don't 



