National opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1865-1874, 1873-12-26
CurlOsities OF Bees.

NurlOsitleS OF lees.
What we know as the queen-bee was
always with the nncicnts, in treating OF
bee-hives, called the king, and was re,
garded as the absolute master Of the
community. They describe him, truly
enough, as being as large as the com
mon bee, more glittering in aspect, and
(says PhAy, with tonch of imagina
tom cor. his brow glitters a whitisE
spot, like n diadem.'
The king is stingless. Modern science
regards this so-called king as mother
and monarch Of the hive. II is found
that she lives four years, and is matched
from the egg in fourteen days; while
the workers require twenty-one days
and the drones twenty-four. These
strange figures are part of the mystery
attaching to bees but still more curl
Gus fact connected with this point is
that bees have the power at will of de
veloping common eggs into queen bees,
This is done by removing an egg into
the royal cell, and feeding the little
grub with n substance Of milky gela-
tinous appearance, known as "royal
ielly." These facts have been ascer-
tainedIwithout doubt, though what the
exact analysis of this "royal Jelly" may
be is utterly unknown. The chief
function of the queen in the hive is to
lay eggs, from which the future popu-
lation will spring. A healthy queen,
during her life, is estimated to lay the
enormous number of 100000 eggs
often in the heat of summer, for months
together, she will lay 1000 day.
Whether these eggs are all alike, or
whether some are distinctly worker-eggs,
and others as distinctly drone-eggs,
is one of the numerous questions on
which all ee-keepers are at issue.
The working bees form the life and
prosperity of the hive. To them belong
industry, labor, patience, ingenuity
in short all the virtues of the race ;
and while each one knows his own
duty, and does it, the efforts of all are
directed towards the veal of the COM
munity.
The working bee never lives longer
than nine months; they labor SO inces-
sanity, that it is supposed they never
sleep. The daily consumption and
waste of large hive Of bees IN summer
may be taken at two pounds ef honey /;
it will show the industry of the work
ing bees to bear in mind that, beyond
this, such a hive in favorable weather
will often accumulate honey to the
amount of four and six pounds daily.
Indeed, it is upon record that a hive
once gained twenty pounds weight of
it in two days 1t is curious that even
a wild hive of bees can soon be taught
to recognize and refrain from attacking
people who approach them.
Within the hectares of many flowers
the bee finds the thin sweet juice
which we know as honey; but when
this is carried home and deposited in
wax cells, it requires to be swallowed
again by the bees, when it undergoes
a thickening process, and becomes
honey proper. Honey gathered almost
exclusively from one kind Of plan. or
flower acquires its special flavor. Thus
clover honey is clear and pleasant both
to the eye and palate, but that made
from sycamore and gooseberry flowers
far exceeds it.
Drones were anciently esteemed i'm
perfect bees the slaves of the true
bees. They work but little, says the
great naturalist of old, but that little
and the heat they cause is useful in
hive. 1t is now known that drones are
really the males of the community, the
gay young bachelors that WOO the
queen when swarming-time arrives.
They have ever served morality as an
awful example to hold up to the young;
'or they never think of working, and it |
s questioned whether, in the midst of
plenty, they even take the trouble to
'eed themselves. Certain it is, that
bees have frequently been
seen feeding them, much as bird sup
olies her gaping young ones. A suit
,ble Nemesis always pursues them
hey are, after time, thrust out of the |
live to perish of starvation, or else ac-
ually murdered. Stingless and lazy,
every one must have seen them before
winter, sitting torpidly on a bough, or
eebly catching the last rays of the
,un. Death is then already laying his
land on them.