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68 



TENTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



W. B. Moore, J. W. Bowen, I. E. 

 Pyles, Aaron Coppin, and Louis Wern- 

 er. They iwere declared elected in the 

 order named. 



Mr. Stone — ^I move that Dr. E. F. 

 Phillips and Dr. G. Bohrer be elected 

 honorary members of this Association. 



Motion seconded. 



Pres. Bowen put the motion, which 

 was carried unanimously. 



Mr. Diebold — I move to make the 

 reporter, Miss Stewart, an honorary 

 member. 



Motion seconded, put and carried. 



Dr. Bohrer — I brought a box of yel- 

 low sweet clover seed with me; I 

 thought the bee-keepers would like to 

 have a little of it. It blooms a little 

 earlier than the white; If you will sow 

 a tablespoonful of it you will get 

 enough of the seed to get quite a start. 



Pres. Bowen — Do you say it blooms 

 the first of the year? 



Dr. Bohrer — Nlo, you sow the seed 

 along in February or March, and it 

 will bloom the next year. 



Bees Carrying Eggs. 



Pres. Bowen — Mr. Crim wants to 

 know if bees carry eggs up into the 

 super through the queen- excluder? 



Dr. Bohrer — That is a very hard 

 question to answer. The past season 

 I had something occur that I could not 

 account for; I don't see how they ever 

 got the queen-cell or where they got 

 the egg; there was not a queen in the 

 hive, and had not been for some weeks, 

 but there was actually the egg from 

 which the queen was reared — a worker 

 egg; where did that egg rome from? 

 I don't know how it got there, unless 

 the bees stole it and carried it to the 

 hive. 



Mr. Moore — "Was that the only egg 

 in the hive? 



Dr. Bohrer — ^^That was the only one. 



Pres. Bowen — ^Did a queen develo> 

 from it? 



Dr. Bohrer — I didn't allow it to re- 

 main until it hatched out; it was un- 

 doubtedly a queen; I opened it and 

 there she was; in a few days more it 

 would have come out, so that I some- 

 times think their efforts are not in 

 vain. I wondered why it was the 

 workers would get to w^ork and lay 

 eggs, because it seems almost an ab- 

 solute certainty that when they are 

 queenless, nothing left but workers to 

 lay eggs, they perish. 



Mr. Crim^Did the workers lay the 

 egg that produced the queen? 



Dr. Bohrer — That is the question — I 

 don't know. I don't see how they could 

 do that unless they were fertilized. I 

 wrote to Prof. Cook concerning that 

 matter and he wrote me an interesting 

 letter; he says he has always found 

 the spermatheca in a dwarfed Condi- 

 tion, and never charged with the sper- 

 matozoa as we find them in the fully 

 developed queen. He goes deeply into 

 the subject; deeper into the matter of 

 entomology than any other book we 

 have on the subject, because he is an 

 entomologist and can do that. I was 

 acquainted with him a very great many 

 years ago, and discussed with him 

 what is known as the drone question. 

 I noticed that some of the queen- 

 breeders today — Mr. Doolittle says that 

 fertilization of the queen affects the 

 drone progeny. J maintain that there 

 is no possibility of it. I expressed my 

 views of it to Prof. Clark, and he wrote 

 me in a letter that he had not only 

 tested the matter, but said he had 

 proved my position was correct, that 

 the fertilization of the queen has 

 nothing whatever to do on this green 

 earth with the drone progeny. 



I wajjted to know, ateo, if his expe- 

 rience taught him that the drone 

 reared from a fertile worker could 

 fertilize queens; he said his impression 

 was the like had occurred. So if a 

 queen cell is put into a hive of that 

 kind it is very certain that they are 

 going to have a fully developed queen. 

 I don't think the fertile workers in 

 a colony are to be dreaded as much as 

 some claim they are. To me this is a 

 very interesting subject. 



I would like to say to the bee-keep- 

 ers here, I don't know whether I will 

 ever be with you or not again. I 

 would not have come this time if it 

 had not been that I agreed to. I want 

 to thank you one and all for the kind 

 treatment I have received at your 

 hands, and have always received — in 

 fact, you did some things I never asked 

 for, and I accepted this evidence of your 

 kindness and respect reluctantly, and 

 I am pleased to note the fact that there 

 is harmony prevalent here that I do 

 not witness everywhere. Every bee- 

 keeper who comes here seems to be in 

 solid earnest about it. 



I believe you are on the right road 

 now to success in securing an efCectual 



