Show italian n bees are most excellent superior to german type and gather more honey in course of year the queen Is the better halt half of the bee family all efforts of the beekeeper bring only failure unless there Is a good queen in the hive according to 13 A slocum of cornell corcell university ver sity no matter how good our equipment how well we have packed tho the bees for winter how generous we are with winter stores of honey and sugar or how abundant the nectar in the blossoms the swarm cannot make a large crop of honey ho be salt said unless the queen to la able to maintain a large colony of of strong active and healthy bees italian bees superior beekeepers Bee keepers mr slocum said believe italian bees are much superior to the german bees commonly known as black bees in nearly all respects they are better workers swarm less are more gentle and are much superior in cleaning out european foul brood unfortunately the black bee was introduced into the united states more than two hundred years before the italian bee and therefore the blacks have become fairly well established in all parts of the country they are now found wild in trees and rocks in every state from coast to coast and in many parts of canada consequently one very good reason why beekeepers bee keepers should rear their own queen bees or secure them from reputable breeders bleeders bre eders Is to get rid of the black blaa bees and hybrids prolific queen needed every colony must be headed by a good prolific queen authorities agree there is not so much difference in the inherited by the different colonies as there Is in the condition of the colonies that Is they pro produce fluce large honey crops because conditions within the hives are ideal this means a large number of strong young bees in healthy condition with conditions around the hive suitable for them to work effectively the good queen ts Is extremely prolific and lays around 2000 eggs a day such a queen must be large and should have a 0 deep body A great number of eggs Is necessary because the amount of honey made by the colony varies directly with the number of strong young bees lil in it |