ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION 



171 



Mr. Coppin — Some of my neighbors 

 have wild grape vines and they com- 

 plained my bees were on it and that 

 they did not get any fruit because the 

 bees destroyed all blossoms, whilst the 

 tame grapes they did not disturb at 

 all. 



Vice-President Miller — I have heard 

 of bees working on grapes. I had a 

 neighbor who claimed my bees, one 

 time, destroyed $200.00 worth of 

 grapes. 



Mr. Coppin — The bees will not de- 

 stroy grapes. The grapes the bees 

 go on, that they were supposed to de- 

 stroy, were already destroyed before 

 the bees went on. They were ripe and 

 broke or something else. Bees will not 

 puncture the skin of sound grapes. 



Vice-President Miller — The jaws of 

 bees are rounded, not sharp like those 

 of some other kinds of insects, like 

 wasps, and they cannot puncture the 

 skin of grapes, but, if this skin is 

 punctured by some other insect, then 

 the bees will suck the juice of grapes. 



If there is nothing further, and we 

 wish to close, a motion for adjourn- 

 ment will be in order. 



Vice-President Miller — There are one 

 or two questions here. 



Question: Will the queen carry 

 American foul brood from the queen 

 raiser's apiary to the purchaser's? 



Mr. Kildow — I don't believe she will, 

 unless the candy in that cage has been 

 made from infected honey. 



Vice-President Miller — Anj^ one else 

 on this point? 



Vice-President Miller — Here is a 

 question : 



Question: What disease? Brood dies 

 after being capped — cappings flat, not 

 sunken — only occasionally perforated — 

 larvae come out whole — seems bloated, 

 but there is no ropiness or scale left — 

 about one row or two of cells around 

 brood not affected — nearly all season. 



Mr. Kildow — Pickle brood. 



Question: In European foul brood 

 location, how many colonies should one 

 care for and keep clean, running for 

 comb honey? 



Mr. Bull — I might say that is entire- 

 ly up to the man who is doing the 

 work. 



Vice-President Miller — Some people 

 are competent and able to do very 

 much more than others; it depends 



upon his knowledge; skill, and ability 

 to get work done. 



Vice-President Miller — I had a ques- 

 tion I intended to ask Mr. France, but I 

 didn't seem to have a good oppor- 

 tunity. 



He stated yesterday, that it was his 

 policy to requeen every year, to raise 

 the best queens. 



I think this question was discussed 

 by Doctor Miller through the Bee 

 Journals some time ago: "How are 

 we going to raise the best queens? 

 How are we going to know which is 

 our best stock if we requeen every 

 year? Has any one a solution for that 

 problem?" 



It takes two years, sometimes three, 

 for me to find out which my best 

 queens are; I find out that some do 

 better the second year than they do 

 the first, ■ while others do better the 

 first year. 



Mr. Bull — The main point of Mr. 

 France's argument w^as to control, 

 swarming. Take that queen away about 

 the 10th or 15th of June; leave the 

 hive queenless, then let them rear a 

 queen, or give them a cell of better 

 stock to prevent swarming. 



Vice-President Miller — ^Where would 

 you get better stock? 



Mr. Bull — Would have to test it out 

 to find which was the best stock; the 

 colony that showed up the best work 

 would be the best; test out a few of 

 those for breeding stock. 



Vice-President Miller— In my yards 

 I have got to the point where it is 

 pretty hard for me to buy anything 

 better than I have. It has not always 

 proven best, in my case to, to send 

 out and get stock and cross with what 

 I have, because what I have is better 

 than what I have been able to buy, 

 recently. Whether crossing of blood 

 would pay or not, I don't know. 



For six or seven years the stock I 

 have bought from queen breeders has 

 not been equal to the stock in my own 

 yard. Probably some of you have had 

 the same experience. 



Mr. Hosman — I notice Mr. France 

 said: After the queen has been caged 

 for a while slie is no more good. This 

 being the case, we could not expect 

 to get good queens by sending for 

 them. 



The only way I can see is to keep 

 track of your colonies and use your 

 best colonies to breed from next fall. 



