330 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Topics of Ijiterest. 



"Hnmliagpry in tie Queen Trade." 



HENKY ALLEY. 



Mr. C. J. Robinson, on page 271, has 

 given the readers of the American Bee 

 Journal a very lively article on the 

 above subject. The reflections on some 

 of the " noted " breeders has attracted 

 my attention. About the only point 

 which I think is aimed directly at me is, 

 "The most recent humbug is the puflSng 

 of yellow Carniolans." Well, let us see 

 how much humbuggery there is in 

 puffing the yellow Carniolans. 



The first Carniolan queen brought to 

 America came to the Bay State Apiary. 

 That was some ten years ago. Of 

 course, the imported queen was used for 

 a breeding queen. As soon as there 

 were plenty of Carniolan drones reared 

 from the imported queen, I had a fine lot 

 of young Carniolan queens to be mated. 



This could not be done in the same 

 yard with the ItalisTns, and so the 

 Carniolan bees were removed to a yard 

 where there were no other bees within a 

 distance of more than one mile. The 

 young queens were mated promptly, and 

 in due time the young worker-bees put 

 in an appearance, and I was surprised 

 to see yellow-banded bees from every 

 queen. 



Now this happened, notwithstanding 

 the fact that there were several thou- 

 sand Carniolan drones in the same yard 

 with the queens. Had but few of the 

 young queens produced bees that gave 

 yellow bands, it would have been nat- 

 ural to suppose that they had mated 

 with Italian drones, but no man of any 

 experience with bees has the least idea 

 that all these young Carniolan queens 

 were mated to Italian drones from an 

 apiary over a mile away, while there 

 were so many Carniolan drones near the 

 queens. 



Here let me say that the imported 

 mother did not produce one worker-bee 

 that had the faintest yellow band. But 

 the young queens were very light col- 

 ored (not yellow), a fact plainly indi- 

 cating that there was some blood in 

 them that was not Carniolan. 



Well, these bees swarmed so much 

 that they were abandoned, and no more 

 Carniolans were reared in my apiary till 

 the year 1889. I then purchased of 

 Andrews & Lockhart a full colony of as 

 fine and well-marked Carniolan bees as 



ever came into America — not a bee in 

 the colony that Was not a typical Car- 

 niolan. Queens were reared from this 

 colony, and the same methods to insure 

 pure mating was adopted as with the 

 imported queen received in 1881. The 

 result, however, was the same. 



I could not produce a "pure" Car- 

 niolan queen, or rather a queen whose 

 bees were purely marked. I found that 

 these bees could easily be bred to a pure 

 golden yellow, clear yellow or orange 

 yellow. So, selecting the light colored 

 queens and drones, I soon produced the 

 golden Carniolan bees. 



Now, can any one tell the readers of 

 the Bee Journal where the "hum- 

 buggery of yellow Carniolan bees" 

 comes in ? Is not the process of produc- 

 ing yellow Carniolan bees as simple as 

 anything can be? Does any one see 

 any reason for cheating or swindling in 

 this matter ? Is there any reason why 

 any one need mate dark Carniolan 

 queens to Italian drones to produce 

 yellow Carniolan bees ? 



Here is a problem for Mr. Robinson to 

 solve : In 1889 I had an order for 

 some Italian queens to be mated to 

 Carniolan drones, and Carniolan queens 

 to be mated to Italian drones. In both 

 cases the progeny of these queens were 

 handsome — yes, beautiful — Italians; not 

 one dark bee from either queen. Why 

 was it that these queens did not produce 

 what are called hybrid bees ? Simply 

 for the reason that the yellow blood 

 predominated. This is all there is 

 about it. 



The Camiola7i race of bees are the 

 original yellow bees. Has any reliable 

 authority decided whether the Italian 

 bees, in their native country, were pro- 

 duced by the Carniolan race, or that the 

 yellow in the Carniolan came from the 

 Italians? 



As not a pure queen has ever come 

 from Italy to America (that is, a queen 

 all of whose worker progeny w.ere three 

 banded, and whose daughters were 

 golden in color), it is safe to say that the 

 bees in Italy are hybrids. 



Why is it that the Italians will degen- 

 erate in color, and breed back to black 

 bees, while the Carniolans will grow 

 more yellow each succeeding generation? 

 Any one "can answer these questions : 

 it is plain and evident enough. 



Why is it that everybody who rears 

 the silver or dark Carniolan queens 

 has the same trouble to produce pure 

 Carniolan bees ? How many queen 

 breeders in this country can say that 

 they have queens that will duplicate 

 themselves ? 



