490 



Tmm mwrnrnmi^MM mmm j@^KffMif. 



othei's, and resembles an inverted 

 cone with the opening at the apex. 

 The difl'erent cells will be found to 

 contain various substances — such as 

 honey, pollen, eggs, and immature 

 bees. 



The queen, or mother-bee is rightly 

 named, for without her no oolonj- can 

 exist but for a short time. She is longer 

 and more slender than the others, and 

 is armed with a sting. The abdomen 

 is quite tapering, and the wings short. 

 She is the only perfect female in the 

 hive, and during the height of the 

 breeding season lays from two to three 

 thousand eggs per day. This seems 

 an exaggeration, but it does not equal 

 the fecundity of the female of the 

 white ant, which lays at the rate of 

 sixty per minute. The queen has it in 

 her power to lay drone or worker 

 eggs. She will deposit !n the worker- 

 cells the right eggs, and as it happens 

 manj' times, the drone-cells border 

 these, but no mistake is made, for on 

 examination no worker is found in a 

 drone-cell, but drones may be found in 

 worker-cells as was intended. This 

 takes place when the apiarist removes 

 all the drone coml), which gives no other 

 place for the drone-eggs. About ten 

 days before swarming, eggs are laid 

 in the queen-cells, so that when the 

 swarm issues a new ruler will be ready 

 to take steps to carry on the work of 

 the old. This work consists mainly of 

 laying the eggs. The queen is much 

 respected by the workers, a body guard 

 of which encircles her. The food con- 

 sists mostly of honey, which is taken 

 from the proboscides of the workers. 



The worker-bee, incorrectly called 

 the neuter, is a female with ovaries 

 imperfectly developed. It is smaller 

 than the queen or drone, but has 

 longer wings, is armed with a sting 

 which it is ever ready to use in de- 

 fense. The instrument is less than 

 one-eighth of an inch in length, is hol- 

 low, and has two sacks at the base that 

 contain poison. The sting is left in 

 the wound, and the poisonous sacks 

 and a portion of the intestines adliere 

 to it. If the sting is removed from the 

 wound immediately, little harm will 

 result. Otherwise the muscles of the 

 sacks contract and force all the poison 

 into the system. When a bee loses its 

 sting, it soon dies. Hornets, wasps, 

 etc., do not have a barbed sting. The}' 

 retain it, and can sting many times in 

 a moment. Does it seem that the 

 worker would be as ready to act on 

 the defense if it knew what would be 

 the result ? The queen is quite dift'er- 

 ent in this respect. She cannot be in- 

 duced to sting except in mortal com- 

 bat with another queen. The bystander 

 will not interfere, and after a short 

 conflict, one falls a victim and the 

 other becomes supreme ruler. 



The hinder legs of the worker con- 

 tain a spoon-shaped cavity or basket 

 in which the pollen from the flowers is 

 gathered, and a sticky substance called 

 bee-glue. 



The worker is furnished with a 

 tongue or proboscis, with which it 

 takes the nectar from the flowers. 

 Honey is gathered, not made. The 

 honey is conveyed to the honey-bag or 

 first stomach. This receptacle is alx)ut 

 the size of a pea, and is furnished with 

 muscles which enable the bee to com- 

 press it and force the contents into the 

 cell. When honey and pollen are 

 abundant, a load of each is gathered. 

 Less than twenty minutes are con- 

 sumed in doing this. When gathering 

 pollen but one kind of flowers is 

 visited, else there would be consider- 

 able confusion in the vegetable world. 

 During the busy season the woi-ker has 

 no rest, and, of course, wears out quite 

 fast. At this time few live to be more 

 than six weeks old. At other times 

 the}' may live five months. An old 

 bee can be distinguished from a young 

 one by the ragged edges of the wings. 

 In the abdomen of the worker are 

 pouches or sacks for the secretion of 

 wax, which is the fat of the bee. This 

 can be formed or not, as required. 



The drones are the male bees. They 

 are longer and stouter than either the 

 queen or workers, but their bodies are 

 not so long as that of the queen. They 

 are not armed with a sting, and have 

 no suitable proboscis for gathering 

 honey from the flowers. There are no 

 baskets on their thighs for holding 

 bee-bread, and no pouches on their 

 abdomens for secreting wax. Many 

 allusions are made about the drone 

 because he is such a lazy fellow. He 

 does what nature intended him to do, 

 and that is all — to impregnate the young 

 queens. Soon after this is accom- 

 plished, the workers destroy them. 

 This is done by biting and stinging, 

 but the sting is not left in the wound. 



The comb is made of wax, and con- 

 sists of hexagonal cells of two sizes. 

 The smaller are the worker, the larger 

 the drone cells. It has been found 

 that no other arrangement will give 

 an equal strength and volume with the 

 same material. 



The more we read and reflect on 

 such subjects, the more we find 



BEE-HIVES. 



The 



New Heddon Hive 

 Re-considered. 



again 



Written fw the American Bee Journal 



BY JAMES HEDDON. 



"Tongues in trees 

 Sermons in 'bees,' 



, books in running brooliB. 

 and 'God' in everylliing." 



Always nieiitiou your Post-Offlce, 

 County and State when writing to this 

 office. No matter where you may happen 

 to be for the lioiir when actually writing— 

 never raentioa anything but your perma- 

 nent address. To do otherwise leads to 

 confusion, unless you desire your address 

 changed. In that case state the old as well 

 as the new address. 



In response to Dr. Tinker's article 

 on page 474, I must say that I am very 

 glad to note that the Doctor holds no 

 ill-will toward me, for truly, as he 

 says, he has no cause to do so. He 

 states that his whole desire has been 

 to forewarn the public against a rec- 

 ognized wrong. Now, candidly, I do 

 not believe that one bee-keeper in one 

 thousand recognizes or contemplates 

 anj' wrong on my part. Nor do I think 

 that the Doctor, with his comparatively 

 limited experience with my hive, and 

 as a honey-producer, exhibits good 

 taste in hastening forward to "fore- 

 warn the public." I did and do think 

 that the Doctor has done me an in- 

 jury, simply to my feelings, but by no 

 means any perceptible injury to my 

 business. When such men as Father 

 Langstroth, Prof. Cook, W. Z. Hutch- 

 inson, R. L. Taylor, Franklin P. Stiles, 

 and many other honest and skillful 

 apiarists, without solicitation, publish 

 reports of such splendid results flowing 

 from the use of the new hive, it cannot 

 be possible that the Doctor's displeas- 

 ure with its use can have much ten- 

 dency to persuade the inexperienced 

 that his views are correct. 



I thank the Doctor, who I believe 

 is a better apicultural historian than 

 practical honey-producer, for aiding 

 me in setting forth the truth, that the 

 principles of my hive are new and 

 novel. As I have three apiaries, and 

 have been a specialist in our chosen 

 pursuit for 20 years, having realized a 

 life competency from the business, 

 nearly all of which has been made 

 from the production and sale of honey, 

 and further, that I have several inven- 

 tions connected witli apiculture, which, 

 after thorough and repeated trial, have 

 gone into general use to stay, while 

 nothing of the kind can be said of the 

 life-work of the Doctor — certainly 

 my judgment should be as good as his. 

 It has been said that I am the one 

 financially interested party, but could 

 I not apply the same muddy argument 

 to my chief disputant ? For years past 

 he has been ottering a hive to the pub- 

 lic in opposition to my own. First, it 

 was something altogether difl'erent 

 from my new hive in both construction 

 and principle. At first his hive pos- 

 sessed, and its patentee plead, for con- 

 tinuous passage-ways. As soon as 

 my hive came out, this hive was laid 

 aside and another entirely difl'erent 

 one was off'ered to the public, and this 

 one contains features embraced in my 



