THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



309 



although long, and she shares it with 

 many colonies of bees. \\'ith the lapse of 

 time the F. B. J. grows thicker ; still another 

 romance opens out its mendacious folds 

 within it ; and the silver question also 

 ( leave the reader to decide whether that is 

 mendacious or not) is given plentiful space 

 for both gold and silver bug. I'm " afeer- 

 ed " that apicultural romancing is going to 

 be one of the dangers of the near future — 

 that the coming bee journal, with three or 

 four interesting stories running, won't care 

 whether it has any significant contents or 

 not. 



I felt somewhat surprised, and perhaps a 

 little humiliated, in reading the answers to 

 query 30 in A. B. J. (>;M. Somebody inno- 

 cently asks the average weight of a prime 

 swarm. And the result — did you ever ? 

 Out of nineteen respondents five rei)ly ofif 

 hand that they never weighed a swarm, and 

 six more might about as well have confess- 

 ed also — leaving only eight out of nineteen 

 bee senators with personal knowledge on a 

 matter which is very easy and open, and 

 also very fundamentol in its nature. I feel 

 in doubt as to what "turpitude of art" 

 would titly salt and pepper the spank which 

 should bo administered to these delinqueiit?. 

 Imagine nineteen married men together — 

 old married me ■ with large families — and 

 some one asks, What is the usual weight of 

 a baby ? How would it look for more than 

 half of them to be unable to tell ? To be 

 sure a man might raise a family very wisely 

 and well without ever weighing a baby ; but 

 such a prf-vailing ignorauceof baby's avoir- 

 dupois would give the impression that there 

 was a pitiful lack of that zest and enthusi- 

 asm with which life should get on, Some- 

 body start a class of beginners in bee cul- 

 ture warranted williug, and more than will- 

 ing, to find out everything about bees that 

 can be got at. 



W. K. Morrison, in Gleanings .'')27, says 

 that in the tropics his bees used to tiy 

 around moonlight nights : but he never got 

 any proof that they gathered anything at 

 night. Thanks for competent testimony on 

 an otherwise suspicious matter. Occasion- 

 al bees Hy nights here. Such a bee comes 

 dashing into the open window of a lighted 

 room, goes for the lamp like a may-bug, 

 and behaves in general as if just out of a 

 lunatic asylum. I think that as a matter of 

 fact these are half crazed bees that will not 

 live many hours, and that they leave the 



hive with no intention of ever going back. 

 Perhaps Mr. M. might as well tell us whether 

 the nocturnal flying which he witnessed 

 might not l)e an exaggerated degree of this 

 kind of flying. 



George L. V'inal, Gleanings 5:50, claims to 

 have proved by actual measurements that 

 late reared (jueens are larger than early ones. 

 He decides them to bo better also. Lays it 

 to their having plenty of time to develop, 

 and several mouths of rest before being 

 driven to tho utmost. Important if true. 



Doolittle on page r>?A] of Gleanings takes 

 up the subject of bee-paralysis. He argues 

 against so much precaution in some respects. 

 I fear he is doing harm, just as many well 

 meaning folks do harm who do 

 not believe in so much care about 

 scirlet fever and dipth?ria. Mr. Doolittle 

 is usually an able reasouer ; but here he 

 seems not to understand the weakness of 

 negative evidence, A dozen T>ersons may 

 enter a house where a case of small pox is 

 sheltered and all fail to take the disease. 

 The failure proves nothing— except that the 

 disease required favorable conditions to 

 take and develop — nothing against the 

 infectious character of the disease. The 

 fact seems to be that many times the queen 

 of a diseased colony is herself free from the 

 disease, and can usually be taken to a 

 healthy colony and carry no infection with 

 her : but a fatal few sometimes — es occur 

 when the disease goes along, as scarlet fever 

 goes with a careless nurse. Perhaps the 

 most helpful saying in the article is that 

 hundreds have tried changing qui-ens ( once 

 suppossed a sure cure) only to find that it 

 has no effect whatever. Still I imagine that 

 an exhaustive search would discover some 

 cases in which the (lucen was more affected 

 than the hive, and in which decided improve- 

 ment would follow her removal. 



Ernest tries the Doolittle method of clip- 

 ping queens with a pen knife and finds it 

 perfection. Dr. Miller tries it and makes a 

 grand bungle. " Many | bee keeper 1 birds 

 of many kind?-. " See Gleanings '-h^H and 



In an editorial in Gleanings ."A'^ drawn 

 combs are strongly preferred to a super 

 with nothing in it but sheets of foundation. 

 Takes too much pressure to get a colony be- 

 gun at the latter, and the pressure results in 

 swarming. A foundation whicii will prac- 

 tically amount to comb, or pretty nearly 

 that, will soon be here the editor hopes. I 



