Copy 1

A treatise on the nature, economy, and practical management of bees / [Robert Huish].

  • Robert Huish
Date:
1817
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A treatise on the nature, economy, and practical management of bees / [Robert Huish]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    gross absurdities. The following are a few of the discoveries of M. Huber: Ist. That the Queen Bee is not fecundated in the hive, but in the open air; and this was conjectured by Moufet some centuries ago. Lombard, a French apiarian, gravely informs us that this discovery con- sequently destroys the system of De Braw. 2d. That the pollen, which until his time was known by the name of crude wax, is not the raw material of the wax, but that it 1s the nourishment of the Bees in their earliest stage. 3d. That it is the saccharine part of the honey which produces the wax in the bodies of the Bees, which they even extract from sugar.* 4th. That the young Queens make such a clapping nowse, as to strike the Bees rmmovable. As, however, the absurdities of M. Huber will be often reverted to in the course of the present work, they shall not in this place be further enlarged upon. In regard to our English apiarians, very little has been done by them towards the establishment of a perfect knowledge of the Bee. Bonner, a Scotch- man, was certainly a good practical apiarian, but he was, unfortunately, beset with most of the preju- dices of the more ancient authors. He took Schirach for his guide, and, by following that particular track, fell into the glaring errors and inconsistencies of that naturalist. ile is one of those apiarians, who pretend to have actually wzewed the operations of the Bees; and, although I here acknowledge to have gained much valuable information from his conversation, yet I have sacrificed many hives at his * This is the general Opinion of the foreign apiarians, from L’Abbé della Rocca to Mr. Ducouedic. It has, however, been successfully combated by Duchet, Ducarne, and others.
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