52 



FOURTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



last but not least, one of the best treat- 

 ments for European Foul Brood." 



Pres. Baxter — The question is — How 

 long- do you keep a good queen? When 

 you have one do you advocate re- 

 queening every year, every two years, 

 or watch your queen and see when she 

 begins to fail and then supersede? 



Mr. Coppin — How many are there 

 who know how old the queens are? 



Pres. Baxter — None, unless you keep 

 a record and even then you are not 

 sure. 



Mr. Coppin — The only way they keep 

 a record is by clipping the wings — and 

 how many do that? 



Mr. Bowen — I do. 



Mr. Coppin — I don't keep a record 

 of age; I did 25 years ago but I don't 

 do it any more; it is quite a little 

 work; it pays in some respects es- 

 pecially where there are high trees for 

 swarms to go up in; it would save 

 the trouble of climbing the trees or 

 anything of that kind; at the same 

 time I don't clip mine any more, and I 

 don't know how old my queens are. 



Mr. Bowen — The way I keep track of 

 queens: I clip the left wang if 1 year 

 old, and the right, if 2 years old, and I 

 know that it is two years old if I find 

 the queen clipped on the right wing. 

 Then in regard to re-queening: I 

 think sometimes it is as necessary to 

 re-queen in six months as at another 

 time it is in 2 years and 6 months; it 

 depends upon the queen. If she is not 

 fully developed and begins to scatter 

 her brood the indications are there is 

 something wrong with her. If you are 

 working bees for fun, you can keep 

 her, but if you want to make money 

 you had better re-queen her. If I have 

 a queen that has been doing service it 

 goes against the grain to kill her. I 

 know one queen that threw off 7 

 swarms. 



It depends upon the length of the 

 season where you are located, how long 

 the queen w^ill last. 



Down on the Illinois bottom the bees 

 have worked in the spring until the 

 asters open in the fall; they have 

 steady work and thej^ will wear out 

 quicker than where they only work 

 part of the season, depending upon 

 white clover only. You have to use 

 your judgment as to what kind of w^ork 

 the queen has been doing and the con- 

 dition they are in. 



Mr. Baxter — That is my view of the 

 subject. Mr. Spencer of the Spencer 



Apiaries in California says he re-queens 

 every year and he is offering his 

 queens for sale so as to make room for 

 new queens. I don't believe in that 

 method. 



Mr. King — If you would see some of 

 those queens that I have seen — you 

 would not know whether they were 

 hornets or wasps. They^ don't look 

 like Italians; I got some from him and 

 kept them only a little while until I 

 could get other queens. 



Mr. Coppin — I was going to ask the 

 gentleman how he could tell the queen 

 was four or five years old if he kept 

 on clipping first one wing and the 

 other; how many sides has the wing? 



Mr. Bowen — I put the date on the 

 hives — then I can tell. We don't want ' 

 to keep them as a rule four years; if 

 we keep them 2 years we are satisfied, 

 but if they are doing good work we 

 don't care very much whether they are 

 four or six years old; . w'e can keep 

 track of them to a certain extent as 

 to which wing we clip. 



Mr. Kildow — I don't believe in clip- 

 ping the queen the first year; you have 

 only one thing to tell, whether you 

 have a good strain of bees; at the end 

 of two years I think it may be a good 

 thing. Sometimes a queen two years 

 old is good; and other times a young 

 queen at four months old is a pretty 

 old queen and you ought to do away 

 with her pretty quick. You can run 

 down your stock easily if you kill ^ 

 queen- one year old. The next year 

 she may do »better. I should not pon- 

 der that it would be a good iplan 

 to kill her at two years old. 



Mr. Stone — If you buy your queens, 

 how are you going to tell how old;they 

 are? ^ 



Mr. Baxter — You are supposed tb /get 

 joung queens. 



. Mr. Stone — This spring I ^yent ito a 

 hive that I was sure had a young queen 

 in it. It was one of the queens I got 

 last spring. I thought there w&s some- 

 thing the matter there; I didn't, see any 

 bees coming out or going in the hive, 

 and I saw nothing but drones on the 

 platform. I examined the hive and 

 found it full of drones; the moths had 

 gotten into it; the queen was there but 

 she was laying nothing but drones on 

 the platform. I examined the hive and 

 found it full of drones; moth had got- 

 ten into it and the queen was there 

 but she was laying nothing but dirone 



