Hi all
We discussed this at length, I know, but this shows that the topic is not new:

A Defense of the Queen-Breeders. BY HENRY ALLEY.

ONCE in awhile some bee-keeper who has purchast a queen and has had bad luck in introducing her, and bad luck in other ways, feels like giving vent to his disappointment, and so he sits down and writes to some of the bee-papers and gives the queen-dealer a “blowing up.” The purchaser is disappointed in several ways : He expected a large, golden-yellow queen, and, above all, had no idea that his queen would not be accepted by the bees, as he had adopted a method for introducing that some prominent bee-keeper had recommended, and there could be no doubt about the success of the undertaking!

But the queen was received ; she was small, dark-colored, and the accompanying bees “were just like hybrids.” About the loss in introducing the queen I will say but little. But does a purchaser expect to get a queen-bee whose condition shall be as good when received as when the queen was put into the cage ? Just consider for a moment what a hard time those bees have had while they were coopt up in the little box, and being rusht about for a week or more in a mail-bag while the temperature is nearly up to 100 degrees in the shade. Is it not a wonder that the bees are alive ? Just think of a mail-bag being grabbed from a crane while an express train is traveling 50 miles an hour! Then, again, how does it affect the bees when a mail-pouch is kickt out the door of a car and the train going at the rate of 40 or more miles an hour ? Sometimes the pouch is left at a station in the hot sun while the temperature is 115 degrees in the clear sunshine ; and, sometimes, too, the mail pouch is placed upon the top of an old stage-coach, and is carried for miles into some back town, and all the while Old Sol is doing his best to cook the contents of the pouch.

Well now, all these things are done all thru the warm season. Some of the people who handle the mail in the cars have lots of fun with the bees they find in the bags, and many queens meet injury and death in that way. But these things are overlookt by the purchasers of queens, and they accuse the dealer of sending them inferior queens. Does any one for a moment suppose a queen dealer would put out and knowingly mail an inferior queen ? I do not believe it. The reputation of the dealer is at stake. Every queen-dealer is trying to send out queens that will be superior to those sent out by his competitor.

“Handsome is that handsome does.” Well, now, queens when in the nuclei of the queen-breeder do look and appear beautiful; in fact, they are beautiful, and give promise—so far as one can judge of appearances and all indications that the queen-breeder must judge quality by—of being superior. I always like to have people come to my yard and select their queens. Then the queens can be seen in all their glory. Of course, all who desire to purchase queens can not avail themselves of this suggestion.

Bee-keepers must not be too hasty to accuse the queen breeder of wrong doing. Be a little charitable, and treat them as you would like to be treated under the same circumstances. Every advertiser of queens stands ready to make good his guarantee, and there is no need of fault finding until the dealer refuses to do so.

Now a word about rearing queens. I have seen good advice given in the various bee-papers in regard to the proper methods for rearing queens. The latest advice and suggestions come from a man who has reared but a few queens. All the things this man has advised and suggested have been practiced nearly 37 years. They are known to all breeders of queens. They are “up” on all points. Yet they do send out some queens that prove on test to be inferior. They do not knowingly do this thing. The queens, when taken from nuclei, seem all right in all respects. No one is trying to see how poor queens he can rear, but how good. The breeders make every effort to please all. Every precaution is taken to guard against injury or loss of queens in the mails. What more can be done ? A good many queens are injured in the mail ; but more are ruined by the methods used in introducing them to full colonies.

American Bee Journal (1900) Volume 40.

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