'(■■ • ^. . ;„■ ? ■™^>?B^' 



140 



SIXTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



had an abundance of basswood years 

 ago right at their door, but it has been 

 cut away, so that the nearest basswood 

 now to the home yard is 3 miles, an-d 

 I notice that when that basswood is in 

 bloom, although it is near one of my 

 apiaries, the home yard works on it. 

 One time I was out on a lake 6 miles 

 across. There was an island, and while 

 out there upon that island bees lit upon 

 my shoulder and excited my curiosity. 

 There was no bee-tree on the island, 

 and I went across to the other side and 

 found bees there working, and they 

 went clear across that 6-mile lake to 

 some hives on the other side. They had 

 one chance to alight if they chose to, in 

 their flight, upon this island; but they 

 certainly were working across the lake 

 6 miles from home. 



Mr. Wheeler — Within the last 2 or 3 

 years I have known apiaries within 2 

 or 2Vz miles of each other, and as far 

 as I know the bees are exactly alike; 

 where one would gather a good crop, 

 the other gathered scarcely any. That 

 proves to me they do not fly far. 



Dr. Miller — That does not prove the 

 point Mr. Wheeler makes. How far 

 did you say? 



Mr. Wheeler — 2 miles. 



Dr. Miller — Here may be something 

 off here, and this yard is gathering 

 upon it — this one nearest to it; it is 

 within its range, but about as far as it 

 will go. This other yard, having 2 miles 

 farther to go, will get nothing. (I don't 

 know whether the stenographer can get 

 all my motions.) The point is this; No 

 matter how much the difference is, 

 there is a difference in the distance, and 

 yet it is very difficult to decide on anj 

 sort of reason why there is this dif- 

 ference between two apiaries. For in- 

 stance, I have two. Take one year with 

 another and the northern apiary will 

 do a good deal better than the southern 

 one. I can not tell any reason why. 

 Sometimes the southern one will do the 

 better. I do not know any reason for 

 that either ; and when you come right 

 down to it, to find out the reasons why 

 bees do things, there are a whole lot 

 of things we don't know. 



Mr. Duby — Maybe we could tell bet- 

 ter if somebody could give us the aver- 

 age speed of bees. I wonder if any- 

 body knows that. 



Dr. Miller — For want of any rate of 

 speed, I give 60 miles per hour. 



Mr. Moore — ^This may be instructive, 



although it i-s not accurate at all. I 

 feel sure I read somewhere that an 

 engineer in his cab saw a bee quite close 

 up to his engine when they were going 

 at a rate of 60 miles an hour, and the 

 bee kept up with the train. If that is 

 true, it throws some light on the flight of 

 the bee. 



Toads and Snakes Eating Bees. 



"Do toads, as a rule, destroy bees, 

 when permitted to stay about the 

 aipiary?" 



Mr. France — There are occasions 

 when I think a toad will destroy a good 

 many bees if allowed to stay about; but 

 while it is destroying those bees, ii 

 there are any moth-millers around, he 

 goes for those, also. I think he "pays 

 his keep" if you let him alone. 



Mr. Wheeler— May I amend the ques- 

 tion so far as to include snakes? Do 

 snakes eat bees? 



Dr. Bohrer — I do not know whether 

 snakes do or not^ I do not like them 

 about the apiary, though. I do not 

 like their looks. 



Pres. York — I doubt if many bee- 

 keepers drink enough to see "snakes" 

 around the hives! 



Dr. Bohrer — I saw one, a blow-snake, 

 6 feet long. But speaking about toads, 

 I have heard them accused of destroy- 

 ing bees to quite an extent. I saw one, 

 I think nearly as large as my fist, sit- 

 ting on the alighting-board of a hive, 

 and I concluded I would watch and 

 see what he was up to. He was looking 

 indifferently at nothing, as far as I 

 could tell, but after a while a bee came 

 in reach and it disappeared a whole lot 

 quicker than it could have gone into 

 the hive if it had done its best. I 

 watched him for a while, and he des- 

 troyed a number of bees, and I destroyed 

 the toad. He was the finest one I ever 

 saw, the finest one I ever raised in 

 Kansas, and it is a good place for toads. 

 They do well. They may catch some 

 millers, but I think my bees are strong 

 .enough so that they will attend to the 

 millers; and I believe we ought to ex- 

 pel the toads from the apiary, as a rule, 

 from what I saw there. Mr. Quinby, 

 in his book, claims they are very de- 

 structive. They may be- kept out by put- 

 ting a board around. 



Mr. Kimmey — I have seen a toad 

 catch a few bees, but it did not seem to 

 be very serious. I have seen the toad 

 near the entrance and the bee was gone. 



