IMPORTANCE OF GOOD QUEENS.

The government census of 1910 gives the average of honey production per colony for the State of Minnesota at five pounds per colony.  Allowing for mistakes which were made in making up this census, there is no doubt that the average amount of honey produced by a colony is not nearly as high as efficient beekeeping would make it.  When some well known beekeepers will average year after year fifty, seventy and even a hundred pounds per colony, there must be something wrong with those who fall far below this amount.

There are many causes responsible for this failure of honey crops.  Bad management, no management at all, antiquated or impossible equipment, locality, etc., are all factors contributing towards a shortage in the honey crop, but poor queens are the most universal cause of disappointment.  The queen being the mother of the whole colony of bees, the hive will be what she is.  If she is of a pure, industrious, gentle, hardy and prolific strain, the colony over which she presides will be uniform, hard working, easy to handle, easy to brave the inclemency of the weather and the severity of our winters, and populous in bees.  The bees partake of the characteristics of the queen.

The fact of the matter is, that more than 90% of our Minnesota queens are either black Germans or hybrids, neither of which lend themselves to pleasant and profitable beekeeping.  Having been inbred for years will make them still less valuable, and most of them have been inbred for generations.

Among many things in which the beekeepers of Minnesota should begin to improve their beekeeping possibilities, the necessity of good queens comes first.  With a new strain of pure, gentle, industrious, leather colored Italian bees, their love for beekeeping should receive a new impetus, leading them to better equipment and better management.

It was with this point in view that the University of Minnesota has secured the best breeding queens obtainable from which to raise several thousands of queens for the use of beekeepers of the state.

These queens will be sold each year during the months of June, July and August at a nominal price of fifty cents each, and not more than three to each beekeeper.  The University is ready to book orders now.  There is such a demand for these queens that last year only one-quarter of the orders could be filled.  Given three pure Italian queens to start with, a beekeeper may easily re-queen his whole bee-yard in the course of a year.  Detailed printed instructions how to proceed will be sent out to all buyers of queens free of charge.

Time has come to start bee-keeping on a more profitable basis, and the first step towards better success should be a new strain of queens.

ENTOMOLOGICAL NOTES

By F.L.  WASHBURN, Professor of Entomology, University of
Minnesota.