April, 1920 



BETTER FRUIT 



Page 17 



Using Bees to Best Advantage During Flow 



By George S. Demuth, Agricultural Assistant, Bee-Culture Investigations 



BROOD rearing, which is of primary 

 importance during the preceding 

 period, becomes of secondary consider- 

 ation at about the beginning of the 

 honey flow, because this is nearing the 

 limit beyond which time the resulting 

 bees develop too late to take part in 

 gathering and storing the crop of honey. 



At this time therefore, there is a 

 radical change in the purpose of the 

 manipulations. Instead of continuing 

 the expansion of the brood-chamber 

 the policy of the beekeeper should now 

 be rather a concentration of the work- 

 ers and the brood. There is perhaps a 

 limit to the number of workers that 

 profitably can be kept in a single hive 

 and set of supers, but this limit is sel- 

 dom reached, the usual mistake being 

 in having too few. Each colony should 

 have its brood-chamber well filled with 

 brood in a compact form and be so 

 crowded w^ith young and vigorous 

 workers that they will immediately oc- 

 cupy the supers when the honey flow 

 actually begins. 



The brood-chambers of colonies oc- 

 cupying more than one hive body 

 should at this time be reduced to one, 

 any extra brood being used in colonies 

 having less than one brood chamber 

 full of brood. After this operation, 

 should there be still some colonies left 

 with the brood-chamber but partly 

 tilled with brood, they should be filled 

 with combs of brood and adhering 

 bees (without the queen) draw from 

 some colony or colonies too weak to 

 work well in comb-honey workers. 



This massing of the workers in 

 strong colonies, so essential to the pro- 

 duction of a fancy grade of comb honey 

 renders necessary extremely careful 

 and skillful management since the ef- 

 forts of the beekeeper may be nullified 

 in two ways: 



(1) The bees, by swarming, may 

 divide their forces into two or more 

 parts, neither of which would be ready 

 to work in the supers until the season 

 is much advanced or perhaps closed 

 entirely, or (2) being defeated in their 



eftorts to swarm or from lack of con- 

 venient storage space, etc., they may 

 do very poor work even during a good 

 honey flow simply because the condi- 

 tions of the colony are such that the 

 storage instinct is dominant. 



To bring about the best results in 

 comb honey, the entire working force 

 of each colony must be kept undivided 

 and the means employed in doing so 

 must be such that the storing instinct 

 remains dominant throughout any 

 given honey flow. 



Any increase made before or during 

 the honey flow is made at the expense 

 of the surplus honey unless it be made 

 with brood that would emerge in time 

 for the young bees to be of use during 

 the honey-flow. In general, however, 

 increases may be made at a much less 

 expense by setting aside some of the 

 colonies for that purpose. To keep 

 the forces together and satisfied with 

 the storing instinct dominant during a 

 good honey-flow is the most difficult 

 problem with which the producer of 

 comb honey must deal. 



Swarming-Preventive and Remedial 

 Measures. 



Colonies do not all behave alike as 

 to swarming. (1) Certain colonies go 

 through the season with apparently no 

 thought of swarming. Such colonies do 

 the very best work in the supers, and 

 their numbers can be increased by skill- 

 ful management. (2) Other colonies 

 start queen cells preparatory to swarm- 

 ing, but can be persuaded to give it up 

 by such mild measures as destroying 

 the queen cells and other methods de- 

 vised, but not extensively used by pro- 

 ducers. Among these methods are fitting 

 the sheet of foundation in place, then 

 directing a fine stream of melted wax 

 along its edges, or the use of split sec- 

 tions in which a sheet of foundation is 

 continuous through a row of sections, 

 extending through their sides and top. 



Some super-construction is such that 

 the sections may be placed directly in 

 the super by the operator who puts in 



the foundation. This work is usually 

 done during the winter months when 

 the bees require no special attention. 

 Enough supers should be provided to 

 take care of the largest possible crop, 

 even though it is not often that all are 

 used the same season. The beekeeper 

 who is operating several apiaries can- 

 not afford to take time to prepare su- 

 pers for the bees during a good honey- 

 flow. Supers of sections thus prepared 

 in advance should be kept clean by 

 storing them in piles and keeping the 

 piles covered with dust. 



Tree Planting 



Editor Better Fruit: — Every spring 

 and fall some trees are planted. Many 

 trees will be planted this spring and 

 again many more will be planted this 

 fall. To get the best results from our 

 labor it must be done right. The old- 

 fashioned way of planting trees is fast 

 being replaced by one that is more mod- 

 ern and gives better results. Each year 

 many trees are lost by not doing it 

 right. Making a hole and sticking a tree 

 in it is not planting trees. Of the trees 

 that were planted this way, many died 

 the first year or never started to sprout. 



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