THE APIARY.

Otago Witness, Issue 3097, 23 July 1913, Page 12

THE APIARY.

(By J.A.)

RESERVES FOR BEEKEEPERS.

The National Beekeepers’ Association is being asked to use its influence with the Government to sot aside areas of 10 acres in new estates that: are being cut up for farming purposes, the areas to be at least throe miles apart, and to be used for pastoral purposes until required for beekeeping. The idea is a good one; but in most districts it comes too late. All, or nearly all, of the most suitable situations for beekeeping are already taken up. It may be that in the North Island more can be done than is now possible in the South Island. We shall watch with interest what may be done in the matter.

This question opens up a still larger one that is causing beekeepers a good deal of thought in the United States, and in the years to come may become a burning one in Now Zealand. The question is the rights of beekeepers to the area they may be working—not *to their site, but to the use of the area covered by their bees. At present beekeepers have no such right. Their bees are necessarily trespassers, and sometimes this causes friction. fortunately, however, the trespass results in great advantages to the farmers, and particularly to the. orchard men, so that from that source there is little or no difficulty. Where the difficulty does come in is when a beekeeper at considerable expense establishes himself, and, showing good results, tempts others to crush in upon the area he occupies, to their mutual disadvantage. Two things at present tend to prevent this. One is the fact that the man in possession is usually able to keep the advantage that his start gives him. Ther# is always a year or two required to make a beekeeper acquainted with his location. This advantage the first man has, and also the. further advantage of being established. The other prevention is that there is an unwritten law operating in the matter. Just as in medicine and other professions, it is infra dig. to encroach on another man’s practice; so in beekeeping the man who selfishly seeks to supplant his brother beekeeper is not favourably regarded by hie confreres. To a certain extent this is a good thing, and we hope that as long as there is pretty room for all without encroachment that beekeepers will respect each other’s right. The larger question, tl.cn, to which we wish to point is that of giving beekeepers a legal right to a certain area. As w.o have said, this question is causing a good deal of thought in the United States. There are some very prominent beekeepers who liave suggested something like the nationalising of apiarian rights and the leasing of areas to beekeepers This, of course, would prevent encroachment, but it bristles with difficulty. The occupier of land naturally wants to have a say in the question, and he may or may not be a beekeeper. On the other hand, the rights to a certain area might be acquired bv a beekeeper for apiary purposes prohibiting the right of occupiers who may wish either themselves or members of their families to take on becKooping. \Vo are in advance of the ago in suggesting these difficulties; but it may well be that only a few years will in some districts make them very real. BEES IN SWITZERLAND. (By Adrian Oetaz.) Not only in Switzerland, but also in some other parts of Europe, the general opinion is that, taken altogether, the black bees are better than the Italians. I think that is an error, and the apparent inferiority is duo to the conditions in which they were placed. In the first place, the prolificness of a queen is very often injured by transportation through the mail, and the entire race is blamed merely because of an accidental circumstance. Then there is the question of mating. Throughout the whole of Europe the apiaries are small, numerous, and very close together compared with America. Furthermore, the majority of hives are skeps or Dox-hivcs, in which drones are reared in immense numbers; the

"advanced destroy their drones as much as possible, not wanting any “ useless consumers ’’ The result is what should be expected. The queens reared mate with common drones of the neighbourhood, and in a few years all traces of Italian blood disappear. The third objection has been made here as well as there very often. The Italian bees swarm too much, or rear brood at the wrong time, or something like that. This, instead of an objection, is an indication of the superiority of the Italian bees, and of the inferiority not only of the black once, but of the apiarist himself. The Italians are more prolific than the blacks. They soon have their hives full of brood, and then, having no more room, swarm. What else could they do? If their owner had given them a larger hive they would have remained, built up a stronger colony, and given far more surplus than the b'acks. jiur some apiarists, like many other men, cannot sec beyond the tips of their noses. Mating Stations.—

(Something: lias boon said about establishing mating stations such as exist in Switzerland. The conditions with us are not the same. As stated above, the apiaries there are email, very numerous, and close together. Many have skeps or box-hives, producing a large number of drones. Under such circumstances the chances of having queens mated with the drones of the same apiary are very slim indeed. Furthermore, and worse yet, if the improved stock is of the same co'our, the rnismating cannot be detected. Thus improvement is impossible. To obviate the difficulty, mating stations arc established in isolated places, the best of stock installed. p'enty of drones are reared, and the apiarists send their queens there to he mated. The charges for it are very moderate.

This brings us to the question whether the worker bees derive their qualities from the drone or the queen stock. From both likely, but 1 think chiefly from the drone. In the human race, and in all of our domestic stocks the- influence of both sides is equal, as far as wo know. But it takes both parents to produce the offspring, no matter whether this is male or female. With bees it is altogether different. The unimprognatod queen eggs produce drones which, of course, derive their characteristic from their mother's stock. Impregnation lias invariably the effect of changing altogether the sex of the eggs. Such being the male’s power, it looks reasonable to conclude tiiar the female Is more like her father than tier mother. Occasionally hermaphrodites are found—-

that is, bees possessing organs of both sexes. Instead of being an intermediate or combination of both sexes, we find invariably some complete female organs associated with some complete male organ —for instance, a worker s head on a drone’s body. This goes to show that where the drone influence reached it it produced full female

organs'. Coining to actual facts, we find Doolittle’s assertions published two or three times in Gleanings in Bee-culture. He introduced the first Italian queens in his locality. All the mismated queens, either black or Italian, that came during the first year were necessarily producing bees of a first crossing. He says that the bees from a black queen fecundated by an Italian drone were invariably gentle, clinging to the combs, and in every respect almost like Italian bees. On the other hand, a cross between a black drone and an Italian queen g;ves workers usually very irascible, as many apiarists know only too well. Frank Benton’s experience corroborates that of Mr Doolittle’s. It -was published in Gleanings some four or five years ago. Non-swarming.— It is said that the improved blacks of Switzerland are almost non-swarming. I don’t doubt it. But it is a question of management rather than stock. The European apiarists work exclusively for extracted honey. There is no difference in price there between extracted and comb honey. They use large hives, mostly the Dadant. Under such conditions very little swarming takes place, no matter what the stock of bees is. Mr Dadant himself obtains as good, or even better, results, ns ho can explain himself more fully.—Knoxville, Tenn.—