400 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUBE. 



Dec. 



instance, a virgin queen entered a transport box in- 

 to which I was introducinor bees with a fertile 

 queen: being on the wing, she was probably attract- 

 ed by th" hurnming sound of the bees. If her en- 

 tn-: T been noticed, she mig-hr have killed 



T t en. and mated after reaching her place 



CI -' :.. 



A lem.e imported queen n:ay die in the transport 

 box, and another be reared, if the first one has l.-iid 

 onlv a single r-g?. Persons who have been largely 

 engaged in breeding queens are aware that well de- 

 veloped queens are occasionally reared in cells 

 which are scarcely more prominent than drone cells. 

 I send with this article a photograph of a piece of 

 comb having two such c-ells. 



The colony from which it was taken was prepared 

 for the reception of a very choice imported queen. 

 A few hours before this' queen arrived, the bees 

 swarmed, and as they clustered and did not return. 

 1 thought at first that some vagrant queen had 

 joined them. <Jn examining the cc>mbs, 1 saw how 

 easily such cells might be over! >oked. From one 

 of them, a queen had hatched which led oflf the 

 swarm, while the other contained a fully developed 

 queen. 



Tlie cells from which these queens emerged are 

 easily distinguished from the other queen cell on 

 this comb, (.toe might almost imagine that the bees 

 made them on purpose to escape the prying eyes 

 and destroying hands of their owner! Made cau- 

 ticur " ■ suth a narrow escape. I ever afterwards, 

 t-e: ^- a valuable queen, acted upon 



tt ■ ' - old medic-al maxim. Fiat ex^Mri- 



fli- . *, and first gave my prepared 



stoci a ^«eci. >:i little value. If she passed the or^ 

 deal unharmed. I was safe in concluding that there 

 was no dwarf queen, fertile worker, or uimoticed 

 queen cell, which might cause the Itss of a more 

 precious queen. This plan has this additional ad- 

 vantage, that if the interior queen is not only well 

 received at first but continues to be so. for a suffi- 

 cient time t<^i show that the bees will not injure her. 

 we may safely conclude that the coljny is in propver 

 condition to rec-eive a queen. 



There is no nec-essitj- for a queens seeking the 

 male again, after she has begun to lay: for her sper- 

 matheca ordinaril.v contains a sufficient number of 

 spermatic filaments to impregnata all the eggs she 

 can lay in the natural course of her life. The life of 

 the queen tieiug so important to the prosperity, and 

 often to the very existenc-e. of a colony, the whole 

 economy of the hive seems to point to an unmistak- 

 able design that she should run no extra ris.ks. One 

 successful wedding excursion gives the tninimum 

 of risk. 



I can easily see how a queen reared on the voyage 

 frrim Italy may be superseded, and the cell in which 

 she was raised" l>e Ki nearly destroyed by the bees. 

 that it may be overlooked entirely, or t-e taken for 

 an old cell from which a queen might have hatched 

 months or even years ago. Ihose importing queens 

 will therefore do well to give these matters very 

 close attention, in order to prefect their customers. 

 While on this subject, let me call attention to the 

 remarkable success which acc-ompanied the first in- 

 trriduction cf the Italian bees into California, being 

 in such wiQe contrast with the ruinous losses in- 

 curred in the impfirtation of these t>ee5 from Italy 

 and Germany, into our eastern seaports. I c-annot 

 do this better than by quoting from the very interest- 

 ing account given "ly Mr. A. J. Biglow. The ac- 

 count in full may be found, p. iJ9tt of the Bee-Keep- 

 er's Directory, by J. S. Haroison, whose fame for 

 enormous crops "of hcney is almost world wide. 



"Mb. J. S. Habbisos:— At your request, I have 

 much pleasure in giving you what few items I have 

 gathered since my connection with the Italian bees, 

 and my experience with them. 



Having rec-eived an invitati'in from Mr. S. B. Par- 

 sons to tiecome his agent in California and Oregon, 

 thrriugh recommendation of Kev. L. L. Langstroth. 

 I left .'^acramento on the first of September last for 

 the Atlantic States. 



* * * The Italians that I have brofight out are 

 of Mr. Parsons' importation: the queens were near- 

 ly all hatched in the month of September; some, 

 however, as late a? Octot»er. 



I prepared one hundred and thirteen packages, 

 with about one-third of a swarm of common bees in 

 each package, and introduced Italian queens as soon 

 as they became settled: the queens filled the combs 

 with efcjT!^. I engaged passage on the steamer Ariel, 

 which left New York on the first of Xovember, and 

 arrived at Aspinwall on the ninth. I remained on 



the Isthmus ten days, and allowed the bees to flv 

 five days. 



Upon giving them their liberty, they immediately 

 commenced work, gathering pollen and honey. 



During these five days. I examined each package 

 and removed all dead bees. I found the brtK>d had 

 all emerged f mm their cells, and the queens were 

 again dep<">siting eggs in abundance. 



On the eleventh of Xovember. one of the swarms 

 deserted its hive and entered one of its neighbor's, 

 which resulted, as I ascertained the next morning, 

 in the death of the two queens. 



I diAided the double swarm, and returned a part of 

 the t>ees to the empty package, and gave them both 

 a comb eonti\ining eggs, and shut them up. and did 

 not open them again until the thirteenth of Decem- 

 ber, when I found as perfect a queen to all appear- 

 ance in each hive as I ever s.'iw, and a large number 

 of queen cells that had been destroyed. 



I have been thus particular in giving an account 

 of this rearing of queens at j<<rn. while confined in 

 their hives, as it may be of interest to naturalists. 

 Xo water was given to my tees during the voyage. 



I sailed fr<:<m Panama, on the steamer Uncle Sam. 

 on the twentieth of November, and arrived at San 

 Francisco on the morning of the sixth of December: 

 shippied that evening on the steamer for Sacramen- 

 to, where I arrived on the seventh inst.. one month 

 and seven days from New York. I overhauled the 

 bees as soon as convenient, and found one hundred 

 and eleven aUve. out of the one hundred and thir- 

 teen. 



Many of the swarms had as many bees when I ar- 

 rived at Sacramento, as when I left New York. I 

 attribute my success to the rearing of so many 

 young bees on the passage from New" York to San 

 Francisco. A. J. Biglow, Sacramento, Dec. 29, 18«iO." 

 L. L. Laxgstroth. 



Oxford, O.. Nov., 1878. 



Thank you. friend L. The idea that a 

 queen might have been reared on the way is 

 certainly "one that nevei- occurred to me. It 

 may have been the cr.se. but I can hardly see 

 how. after all : for the frames are very small, 

 and no e^gs or brood of any kind are ever 

 found when they reach us. In a few of 

 them we did findfins of new comb that was 

 probably built soon after they started, and 

 eggs might have been laid, brood reared, 

 and gueens hatched. I say it might have 

 been, but from the appearance of the little 

 combs, it seems almo.st impossible. I am 

 weU acquainted with the way in which queen 

 cells are sometimes built, and I have often 

 found them, where others had declared there 

 could be none : nothing indicated it to me, 

 except the lump of wax that had no visible 

 opening underneath. Cutting into it re- 

 vealed the queen. Again; la i/ing ([ueinshuxe 

 been sent out from my own apiary, which, 

 my cu-stomers have assured me. afterward 

 tlew out and were fertilized. It may be my 

 customers were misUiken. but I liave no 

 doubt they were honest. It may be also, 

 that we have, in a few instances, gone for a 

 queen, to a hive that contained two queens, 

 one laying, and the other not. If we should 

 see the combs full of eggs, and then find a 

 queen, it would be quite natural to send the 

 queen off. as a laying one. In two instan- 

 ces this summer, "we have found queens in 

 hives where they were su])posed to be queen- 

 less : one of tliese was a laying queen. I am 

 somewhat undecided as to where the truth 

 lies, but I have seen so many queens, im- 

 ported and otherwise, after 'having been 

 sometime confined in a cige where they 

 could not lay. take wing and tiy witli almost 

 precisely the movements of a virgin queen, 

 that I fear we are going to tind a second fer- 

 tilization to be possible, even though it looks 

 unreasonable. Facts are stubborn things. 



