602 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



some having a part of two or three 

 combs uncapped, containing brood in 

 the last stage, others with but a small 

 percentage of the advanced brood 

 capped— noticing this in 20 out of 200 

 colonies for a whole season, as the 

 bees emerge to see eggs placed in the 

 cells hatch and mature, and the opera- 

 tion repeated over and over again, 

 which is the case, he would at least be 

 justiflable in saying that if the wax- 

 moth is at all instrumental in produc- 

 ing this state of affairs, its dealings 

 are not " direct." 



With regret I confess my inability 

 to give any explanation of the cause. 

 I simply stated facts as they appeared 

 to me. I have not even a theory to 

 advance, though personally I am sat- 

 isfied that it is a freak, rather than 

 disease, which characterizes the prog- 

 eny of certain queens. 



Doubtless some of our veteran api- 

 arists have had some experience with 

 the phenomenon in question, and 

 could, without difiBculty, explain the 

 cause, or at least favor the public 

 ■with their views. I should like to 

 hear from Mr. Osburn, of Cuba, on 

 this subject; or from any one that 

 has had any experience with " bare- 

 headed " brood. 



Titusville,x) Pa. 



Read before the Florida Fruit Association. 



Interestins Facts aliont Honey-Bees. 



JAMES M. LISENBT. 



The great secret of success in bee- 

 keeping is simple and thorough man- 

 agement. This can only be accom- 

 plished by a complete understanding 

 of the nature, habits, and require- 

 ments of the honey-bee, combined 

 with labor, study, and experience in 

 handling them, and a mechanical 

 knowledge of the construction of 

 hives that will give the greatest profit 

 with the least outlay of money and 

 labor. 



Everything should be in order 

 about the apiary. Let everything be 

 perfectly clean about the hives, the 

 grass and weeds cut from about the 

 entrances, and, if in a locality where 

 the ants bother, the hives should be 

 placed upon a bench with supporting 

 parts that have been tarred, over 

 which the ants will not crawl. The 

 bee-keeper should work with gentle- 

 ness and care, avoiding jarring move- 

 ments or anything that will agitate 

 the bees. If the bee-keeper is timid 

 or wishes to protect himself from 

 being stung, he should wear a veil. 

 Care should always be taken that 

 each hive contains a queen. If any 

 are found to be queenless, they should 

 be supplied with brood from some 

 strong colony, or doubled up with a 

 weak colony. 



The queen's office is to lay eggs ; 

 she is, properly speaking, the mother 

 of the colony, and the only perfectly 

 developed female in the hive. If 

 there is plenty of cells for her use, 

 she will deposit about 3;000 eggs per 

 day, during the best breeding season. 

 The native queen is much darker 

 than the drones or workers, but the 

 Italian queen is brighter than either. 



The queen has shorter wings than 

 either workers or drones, with a long, 

 finely tapered abdomen. She has a 

 sting, but will never use it only in 

 combat with a rival queen. A queen 

 can be reared from any egg that will 

 produce a worker. The bees prepare 

 tor rearing a queen after the egg is 

 laid, by cutting away the small cells 

 around it and forming a large cell 

 about the shape of a pea-nut about 

 the egg. When a queen is lost, the 

 bees will immediately form a number 

 of these cells. When the first one 

 hatches she will immediately destroy 

 the others, unless prevented from 

 doing so by the workers, in which 

 case she will leave the hive with a 

 portion of the bees, thereby causing 

 them to swarm. This can be pre- 

 vented by watching, and when the 

 first queen is about to hatch, destroy 

 the others. In about five days after 

 the queen hatches she will leave the 

 hive to meet the drone. This once 

 accomplished suffices for life, and 

 she returns to the hive never to leave 

 it unless with a swarm. The length 

 of a queen's life is from three to 

 five years. 



The drones are shorter and more 

 bulky than queens; they are larger 

 than the workers, and make a loud 

 noise when flying ; they have no sting, 

 and are physically disqualified from 

 performing any labor ; they are reared 

 about the commencement of the 

 swarming season to the amount of a 

 few hundred in each hive ; their only 

 duty is to impregnate the young 

 queens, and as soon as the swarming 

 season is over, they are destroyed by 

 the workers. Where there is a large 

 apiary there should only be a small 

 portion of drone-comb left in each 

 hive, and thereby prevent an over- 

 production of drones. 



The workers live from 30 to 120 

 days. Upon them devolves the duty 

 of building combs, supplying the hive 

 with provisions, and protecting the 

 stores. The comb grows in rings on 

 the abdomen of the workers. Each 

 worker is an undeveloped female, and 

 would have been a queen had the cell 

 in which they were reared been large 

 enough. The habits and instincts of 

 the workers are too well known to be 

 further discussed. From the time 

 the egg is laid until the hatching of 

 the bee is, for the worker, about 21 

 days ; the drone. 24 days ; and the 

 queen, 16 days. In this climate they 

 breed the entire year, but iu colder 

 countries but little brood is found in 

 winter. 



When the honey season sets in, you 

 may naturally expect swarming to 

 follow, and after the first swarm 

 issues others should be prevented 

 from issuing for the time being, by 

 watching, and when the first queen- 

 cell is about to hatch, destroy the 

 others; otherwise they may swarm 

 too much and become weak and, 

 without great care, fall a prey to the 

 moth. But the system of dividing 

 colonies is considered better than 

 natural swarming, for by this system 

 the loss of bees by absconding is ob- 

 viated. The best method of dividing 

 is to take from one to three frames of 

 brood from different hives, according 



to strength and liability to swarm, 

 putting empty frames in their places 

 in the old hives, then place the brood 

 so taken in an empty hive, and, near 

 the middle of a nice, warm day, re- 

 move some strong colony from its 

 stand and place the new one where 

 the old one stood, so as to catch what 

 bees are in the fields on their return. 

 They can now be left to rear a queen 

 themselves, or be given a queen or 

 queen-cell from a queen-rearing hive. 

 Gainesville, 5 Fla. 



TOT tne Amencaa Bee Journal. 



Tte Apiary Near a Riyer. 



3IAHALA B. CHADDOCK. 



I do not believe that it pays to keep 

 bees in Central Illinois unless there is 

 a river near the apiary. Mrs. L. 

 Harrison is on the Illinois river ; the 

 Dadants on the Mississippi ; I beheve 

 Dr. C. C. Miller is on a river, and Mrs. 

 Axtell, of Koseville, is near a river. 

 Speak out, everybody, and let us 

 know. 



I have seen letters in various bee- 

 papers from a man named Graves, on 

 Spoon river, that has lots of fall honey 

 nearly every year, when I have none. 

 I have never had but one good fall 

 honey crop since i have kept bees. I 

 do not live near any river. There is 

 goldenrod and some other flowers 

 along the creeks, but the bees never 

 store any honey from them, for me. 

 This fall there is a less amount than 

 usual. 



We had a rain (not a heavy one) 

 about three weeks ago— the first that 

 we have had to lay the dust since 

 July 3. The wells are all nearly dry, 

 but the pastures have grown green 

 again. Smart-weed is in bloom, and 

 the bees are working on it. But 

 smart- weed does not amount to much 

 in dry weather. 



Vermont,K) Ills. 



Pacific Rural Press. 



Teiper of Bees-Plea for Cyprians. 



A. NORTON. 



The temper of the various races of 

 bees is, perhaps, the principal subject 

 of inquiry by the masses concerning 

 them. With many this makes little 

 difference. In a large apiary run for 

 extracted honey, such as we find in 

 the southern counties of this State, 

 the rapid handling that is generally 

 necessary will render any bee vicious. 

 Bee-keepers get used to it to such a 

 degree that they are as much at home 

 among irritable bees as among gentle 

 ones. 



Others, however, desire to find bees 

 that will permit frequent examination 

 without resenting it. Having but 

 few colonies of bees, they can spare 

 the time to handle slowly and gently, 

 and to pet the insects without stint. 

 Unless it be the Carniolans, which I 

 have not seen, it is only a trite state- 

 ment that Italians in their purity 

 surpass all others for such persons. I 



