1918 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



275 



twenty or thirty years ; our poet 

 considered "The term of a short life 

 awaits individual bees, yet the race 

 remains imperishable — not more than 

 seven years is passed by them." 

 He distinguished two different kinds 

 of bees, and showed his preference 

 for the one he characterized as the 

 "better breed," because it was the 

 race from whose combs you will 

 press the most of sweet honey, and 

 *hat of a better quality. As there 

 were two kinds of bees, so he held 

 there were two kinds of king. One 

 is distinguished by his mien and con- 

 spicuous appearance. One king is 

 disgustingly squalid, the other shines 

 and sparkles with brightness, ablaze 

 with gold. 



The time of swarming was a joyful 

 one, When swarms issue they float 

 through the serene summer sky. 

 Then, to attract them, sprinkle the 

 juices prescribed, bruised balm and 

 the herb of honey wort. Ring bells 

 and beat around the cymbals of 

 Mother Cybele (the Mother of the 

 Gods), and they will settle them- 

 selves in the seats prepared. This 

 seems to be a kind of self-hiving. A 

 cure for undue swarming is given: 

 "Just disable the wings of their chief 

 and while they stay no bee will dare 

 to leave the hive." Here is the ori- 

 gin of clipping the queen's wing. At 

 swarming time, or at other periods, 

 ancient bees were fond of engaging 

 in mortal combat. Violent animosity 

 and excitement arises between rival 

 chiefs. Then hearts are panting for 

 war. Sounds are heard like the trum- 

 pet and the bugle. Then they sharpen 

 their stings on their proboscis. They 

 meet in shock of battle, mingle in a 

 whirling mass and fall headlong. 

 Their chiefs wield mighty souls in 

 their tiny bosoms. Then sprinkle 

 over them a little dust and put the 

 inferior leader to death, he being a 

 superfluity. 



Bees had many enemies in addition 

 to rival bees. Keep the speckled liz- 

 ard with scaly backs from the well- 

 stocked hives. Of birds, the wood- 

 pecker is a determined enemy, and 

 so is the swallow, for they devastate 

 all around and in their mouths they 

 bear away the bees while on the 

 wing to be a sweet morsel to their 

 merciless young. Cockroaches that 

 shun the light, the fierce hornet, or 

 the moths, a horrid crew, the spider 

 with its nets around the doorway, 

 are all noted enemies of bees. Above 

 all, however, "fell disease," as in our 

 day, entailed misfortune on bees and 

 beekeepers. He gives elaborate di- 

 rections for curing, but seems to rely 

 on Schirach's remedy of first killing 

 the bees, and, to cure, cleaning out 

 and thoroughly disinfecting the 

 hives. 



In Virgil's time beekeepers appro- 

 priated the surplus honey twice a 

 year — after the early and the latter 

 flow. In carrying out this operation 

 everything must be scrupulously 

 clean. First wash your body, foment 

 your mouth with draughts of water, 

 and then with your hand thrust for- 

 ward the persecuting smoke. If the 

 stores are scant, or a severe winter 

 is anticipated, he advises that they 

 should be denuded of little honey, in 

 order that their lives may be spared 



for another season of work and in- 

 crease. This honey they looked on 

 as the gift of the gods, which came 

 down from the skies as a dew. The 

 flowers gave glue, wax and "animable 

 matter" from which bees were bred. 

 The other means used for resurrect- 

 ing bees and peopling hives where 

 they died is told in the mythological 

 tale of the shepherd, Aristaeus, but 

 the legend is much older and was 

 borrowed by Virgil from Egyptian 

 literature. 



The faultless poetry of the Fourth 

 Georgic suffers both from transla- 

 tion and from being presented in 

 prose, but as far as possible, the 

 above has been given in the author's 

 words. 



Banffs, Scotland. 



The Metal Honeycomb 



By Dr. A. F. Bonney. 



THE writer lately received a set 

 (10) of the aluminum honey- 

 combs advertised by a Califor- 

 nia party, and put them to use. They 

 were put singly into brood-cham- 

 bers filled with brood and honey, and 

 in "Demareeing" I put four in the 

 center and filled out with drawn 

 combs, as I much prefer to put 

 my foundation above an excluder, for 

 it is drawn out closer to the frames. 

 After an interval of six days I ex- 

 amined all of the nine I had put in, 

 and in every case the bees had gone 

 to work in them the same as in the 

 wax combs. I could not see that 

 they had discriminated at all. 



These metal combs are made of 

 very thin aluminum, almost a foil, 

 and are as deep as the average fin- 

 ished comb. They will, of course, be 

 moth-larva proof, and as they are 



strengthened with three wires of 

 about 20-gauge, English, running 

 from top to bottom bars, they should 

 resist the centrifugal action of the 

 extractor nicely. However, there is 

 I think, one very serious objection; 

 the metal is so thin and soft that the 

 slightest blow spoils the opening of 

 the cells, when it is necessary to 

 spend time to restore the size, if not 

 the shape of the opening. 



This defect might be remedied by 

 using a thicker metal, but this, at the 

 present price of aluminum, would 

 make the cost prohibitive. The pres- 

 ent price, 55 cents at the factory, is 

 almost too high to allow their use on 

 a large scale. 



My remedy would be to make the 

 cells about one-fourth of an inch 

 deep, of a reasonable heavy metal, 

 dip them in wax when they are 

 mounted in the frames, and allow the 

 bees to draw them out, as they will, 

 as I know from experiments made 

 recently. 



I am now working on some square, 

 round and triangular cells, merely to 

 see what the little animals will do 

 with them. 



Buck Grove, Iowa. 



There is another possible objec- 

 tion to this metal in combs. It is the 

 effect of temperature in our change- 

 able climate. Beeswax is a non-con- 

 ductor of heat and it stands the dif- 

 ferences between the coldest and 

 hottest weather without bad effect. 

 Metals are good conductors of heat 

 and cold, and metal in the hive 

 combs may be the cause of still 

 greater troubles than we now have 

 in wintering. — Editor. 



Bee -Keeping mb For Women 



Conducted by Miss Emma M. Wilson, Mareoeo, 111. 



Swarm Prevention in War Time 



Never before has it occurred — and 

 let us hope that it may never occur 

 again — that so many women have 

 been obliged to take up the care of 

 bees because the husband, brother, or 

 son, the beekeeper of the family, has 

 been called to become a soldier in 

 this war for righteousness. In many 

 cases, it would be a thing greatly de- 

 sired if the bees could be allowed to 

 stand still, just as they are, until the 

 return of the beekeeper, so that he 

 might again take up the work just 

 where he left off. That may not be ; 

 but it might be to some extent ap- 

 proximated if it were not for that 

 troublesome thing — swarming. Left 

 to themselves the bees will swarm 

 and swarm, the swarms going off and 

 being lost, and the summer's harvest 

 being lost with them. 



Fortunately, we are not entirely 

 helpless, and there is no reason why 

 a woman, as well as a man, may not 

 be able to overcome the swarm-devil 

 and end the season with a maximum 

 crop of honey. 



All queens should be clipped, the 

 two wings on one side being cut 

 away. Not that a colony with a 

 clipped queen will not swarm; it will 

 swarm just as promptly as if the 

 queen's wings were wdiole. But she 

 cannot go off with the swarm, and the 

 swarm, finding it has no queen, will 

 return. The worst thing that can 

 happen will be that the queen will be 

 lost; and it is better to lose the 

 queen than to lose both swarm and 

 queen. And then there will be a 

 week or so to provide against a 

 swarm going off with the young 

 queen that will emerge. 



Even while having all queens 

 clipped, we must proceed so as to re- 

 duce swarming to a negligible quan- 

 tity, if not to prevent it altogether, 

 without reference to whether the 

 queen is clipped or not. One of the 

 important things is to provide ven- 

 tilation. Not merely what might be 

 considered plenty, but abundance of 

 it. Unless there is a deep bottom- 

 board with a large entrance, it is not 

 a bad plan to raise the hive perhaps 



