6o6 
BEES AND BEE-KEEPING. 
struggling with the problem, and although conquering 
difficulty after difficulty, and giving to his queens and 
drones considerable flight-space, he has failed, up 
to the present, to achieve what could be called a 
practical success. Mr. McLain* has had very similar 
experiences, as in his last Report he states that he 
had six colonies in a house loft. by i6ft., and 8ft. 
high, partly covered with wire-cloth. These colonies 
knew their location, and returned freely to their 
hives. Into these six virgin queens were introduced. 
When the latter were five days old, ten drones 
were liberated near to the entrance of each colony. 
Most of the drones persisted in flying against the 
wire. “ When the young queens flew from the hive, 
seeking a mate, they mingled among the drones, 
crawling over them, and caressing them with their 
antennae, meeting with no response. These queens, 
with one exception, seemed to have no difficulty in 
getting the location of their respective hives. The 
result was, one queen mated. Mr. McLain concludes 
that the difficulty was in the irresponsiveness of the 
drones. To explain this, he supposes drones not 
capable until specially fed by the workers, an idea for 
which I venture to think the evidence insufficient. 
He seems to believe this special feeding supplies the 
secretion ' which I pointed out as coming from the 
mucous gland (see page 199, Vol. I., where 1 have 
explained that drones are not all, or always, in a 
virile condition). Having inserted six other virgin 
queens into the same six stocks, he secured a strong 
colony under the swarming impulse, in which queen- 
“ Report on Experiments in Apiculture,” by Nelson W. McLain, 1887, 
