The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1883-04-19
A Few Facts About Bees.

Successful bee management must OF
/ necessity be based on correct knowledge
| Cd the instincts and habits of bees.
/ Without going into the minute details
/ which thorough naturalist would be
/ curious to master, there are certain
facts capable of being put into small
compass, with which it is absolutely
necessary every bee-keeper should be
familiar. These we propose to state in
this article.
Bees are of three kinds. Every com
/ pIete hive or colony contains one queen,
a number of drones (the fewer the bet
| ter), and a multitude of workers Cthe
more the merrier.) The queen is the
only perfect female and lays all the eggs
from which all the other bees are pro
duced. The eggs are of two different
kinds. The one matches into drones
OF male bees. while the 9th
er produces workers. These, how
ever, are simply undeveloped females,
and every wOrker-egg is capable, under
special treatment, of developing into a
perfect female OF. queen. The special
treatment consists in building what is
called a queen cell, a roOmv, pendant
receptacle, somewhat resembling a pea
nut, housing the egg or young larYa
therein, and feeding it with a peculiar
substance, known among bee-keepers
as "rOyal iellv." This food has the
effect of fully developing the young fe-
male, so that she comes upon the STAGE
of life fully qualified to increase and
multiply. Instinct impels bees to rear
queens when the colony becomes very
populouS and swarming time is at hand.
also at any time when the colony is de-
prived of its queen. Only one queen
with few EXCEPTIONS is required or al
lowed in a hive at one time Sometimes
queen will wander into the wrong
hive; at other times bad weather pre-
vents swaTming, though the prepara-
tiOns have been made for it, and in such
cases queen slaughter is very apt to
take place, unless, as often happens, the
workers protect the Young queens until
the weather is more favorable and cir
cumstances are more propitiOus for
swarming. Within few DAYS after being
Matched, the young queen issues from the
hive on what is prettily called her
. bridal tour -cOurtship, marriage and
impregnatiOn being all accomplished on
the wing, during brief fight Only
for this purpose does the queen ever
leave the hive, except when a swarm is
sues. One impregnation lasts for a
lifetime. Before it occurs, strange to
say, the queen has the power 10 Law
drone eggs; afterward she is capable of
laying both dTone and worker eggs. 1t /
sometimes happens that a queen fails to
meet drone at the proper period for
fertilization. She then becomes droue- .
layer, and with such a queen a colony is .
doomed to extinction. This and other /
facts in the natural history Of the bee T.
show the utility of the movable frame (
hive, which admits of examination. and /
permits the bec-kceper to remove a
drone-layIng queen and give the wasting I
colony fertile queen or brood out of /
which to rear one The queen bee is .
endowed with wonderful prolificacv. and .
when hOney-tOrage is plentiful. instinct
impels her to put forth all her ENERGIES .
in the direction of fecunditv. 1t has .
been ascertained by careful experiments
that fertile queen IS capable of LAYING
upward of two thousand eggs in a day.
Her prOllicaCy Is regulated by the sup
ply of honey, and. hence, it is the
policy of all good bee-keepers to feed in
early spring, 50 the colony will be ready
with 4 strong force of young bees to
take advantage of the honey season,
when it comes.
The average lifetime of a queen is
about three years; but they do not Law
SO well the third year. If they are not
prolific the third year, we remove them
and replace them with young, prolific
Worker bees are short-lived,
not averaging more than six weeks in
the busy season. Droncs are also.shoTt-
lived. They are reared in the spring,
when the colony becomes strong and
the time approaches for swarming; and
when the honey season Is over the
worker bees drive them out of the hive
or sting them TO death.-C =. Dodd. ~
~ T. IpdepeHdeRt