MANUAL OF APICULTURE. 



CHAPTER I. 



CLASSIFICATION OF THE HONEY BEE 

 THE DIFFERENT SPECIES AND RACES. 



A knowledge of the structural peculiarities and the life liistory of 

 bees will aid anyone who essays to manage them for profit in deter- 

 mining more accurately what conditions are necessary to their greatest 

 welfare. It is not to be understood that such knowledge will take the 

 place of an acquaintance with those conditions under which actual 

 practice has shown that bees thrive, but that it forms a good basis for 

 an understanding of whatever practice has found best in the manage- 

 ment of these industrious and profitable insects. It will also assist in 

 pointing out in what way practice can be improved. 



In a small treatise like the present one, the object of which is to give 

 in plain language the information needed by one who engages in bee 

 keeping primaril}^ for profit, it is not possible to do more than present 

 a mere outline of classification and a few general facts regarding struc- 

 ture. The reader who finds them interesting and valuable in his work 

 is reminded that the treatment of these matters in more extenrled 

 volumes, such as Langstroth's, Cheshire's, etc., will be found far more so. 



Singling out from the order Hymenoi)tera, or membranous-winged 

 insects, the family Apidcie, or bee family, several marked types called 

 genera are seen to compose it, such as Apis (the hive bee), Bomhus (the 

 bumble bee), Xylocopa (the carpenter bee), Megachile (the leaf-cutter), 

 MeUpona (the stingless honey bee of the American tropics), etc. All 

 of these are very interesting to study, and each fulfills a i^urpose in 

 the economy of nature; but the plan of these pages can only be to con- 

 sider the first genus, Ajns, or the hive bee. Incidentally it may be 

 mentioned that the plan of introducing the stingless bees [MeUpona] 

 from tropical America has frequently been brought uj) with the expec- 

 tation of realizing important practical results from it. These bees 

 might possibly be kept in the warmer portions of our country, but their 

 honey yield is small, not well ripened, and not easily harvested in good 

 shape, since the honey cells are of dark wax, like that made by our 

 bumble bees, and they are not arranged in regular order, but in irregular 

 clumps like those of bumble bees. The writer had a colony under obser- 

 vation last year, and experiments have been made with them in their 

 native lands as well as in European countries. Of the genus Apis the 

 only representative in this country is mellijica, although several others 

 are natives of Asia and Africa. 



11 



