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SIXTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



can, and I think I can make more by 

 letting the bees do the work; and now- 

 adays I do not practice meddHng with 

 the queens except in an occasional — very 

 exceptional case. Of course, once in a 

 while, when I see that there is any need 

 of a new queen, and that the bees are 

 not likely to supersede the queen them- 

 selves immediately, I may interfere ! but 

 I let the bees do that work, and 1 do 

 not believe that I could improve much 

 on it any way. 



Mr. Whitney — If you find you have 

 an old queen, and she is liable to be 

 superseded, perhaps in the fall, it seems 

 to me it would be a good deal better 

 to supersede her in August than to let 

 the bees supersede her in October when 

 there are no drones flying, when you are 

 liable to have a virgin queen there, to 

 be a drone-layer in the spring. 



Mr. Taylor — That is not likely to be 

 the case. Bees supersede their queens 

 in the summer-time. Of course, that is 

 the time to do it, and they seem to know 

 that that is the time to do it. Of course, 

 there may be exceptional cases, but I 

 should very much dislike to overhaul 

 50 colonies of bees to find out whether 

 there was one queen that needed super- 

 seding, because the bees were going to 

 supersede her in the fall. It doesn't 

 pay. 



Mr. Whitney — Keep a record of the 

 age of the queens. 



Mr. Taylor — That makes lots of 

 work. 



Mr. Wilcox — I am astonished, and I 

 want to know if anybodj^ else has ever 

 thought of such a thing as queens be- 

 ing superseded in October, a month or 

 two after the season's harvest was over. 

 I did not know that such a thing ever 

 happened except by accident. 



Mr. Abbott — I confess I am aston- 

 ished. I am like Dr. Miller now. I 

 am more astonished than he was, to 

 think that any one would advocate at 

 this time that we should let nature alone. 

 Let me give you an illustration from 

 the dairy business : The Babcock test 

 has eliminated from the dairies of this 

 country about half the cows that were 

 in the hands of intelligent dairymen, be- 

 cause they were eating more than they 

 produced. It is not necessary to over- 

 haul a colony to see how old the queen 

 is. It is unnecessary to "count the 

 rings on her horns" as you do on a 

 cow to see how old she is. It is only 

 necessary for the intelligent manipulator 



to know that there is a colony. No. 22, 

 that is not paying its way. If 22 is 

 not paying its way, 9 chances out of 

 ID the queen is responsible for the non- 

 payment. An intelligent answer, it 

 seems to me, would be to take off the 

 head of No. 22's queen and put one in 

 there that you thought was better. That 

 would be improving on what we call 

 the "natural method," just as the dairy 

 people by selection have improved the 

 Jersey cows and the Holstein cows un- 

 til they have nearly doubled the but- 

 ter-production of the Holstein herds. 

 If they can double the butter-produc- 

 tion of the Holsteins by careful selec- 

 tion, can not the bee-keepers and queen- 

 breeders ehminate the poor queens and 

 double the production of the colonies 

 of bees in the country in the same way? 

 It seems to me we can. This is an 

 age of progress and scientific investiga- 

 tion, 'and we ought to take advantage 

 of it, it seems to me. Take the heads 

 off the queens whose colonies are not 

 paying their way. 



Mr. Taylor — I do not like to take up 

 the time of this Association in talk- 

 ing. I like to say a 'word once in a 

 while, but I do not like to talk so much. 

 If you are willing to bear with me a 

 few minutes, I will try to explain this 

 thing that Mr. Abbott seems to be en- 

 tirely astray on. Now the two cases are 

 not parallel at all. 



Dr. Miller— Correct. 



Mr. Taylor — I am glad you are with 

 me. Doctor. They are not parallel at 

 all. It will take me 2 or 3 minutes to 

 explain why they are not parallel. Take 

 cattle. I suppose originally they were 

 in a wild state, and they had long horns 

 and they were fleet of foot, and they 

 had great courage, and they were rust- 

 lers. That is, they were fitted to their 

 environment. They were so construct- 

 ed and so developed that they were 

 able to survive under the hard circum- 

 stances in which they were placed. They 

 were able to fight. They were able to 

 escape their enemies by flight, when it 

 was really necesssary. They were able to 

 hunt -their food in difficult places. Now, 

 then, suppose Mr. Abbott had some of 

 those cattle and he wanted to develop 

 them in the line of fighting and rustling 

 for their food and fleeing from enemies, 

 and this sort of thing. Would he be so 

 particular about picking out animals 

 that were not fleet and not fighters? 

 Why, no. He would not expect to de- 



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