^ ! 



58 



seventeenth: annual report of the 



am 



extraordinarily good queen, the col^^^ay 

 be very weak at unpacking time, but yet 

 I can build up that colony, if the queen is 

 the right kind of queen, and produce 

 honey than any other colony that I . 

 on the place. I have done it, tinof 

 again. ' 



Another thh^g, that is a question T 

 asked at these mfe€^tin^, if you take those 

 colonies and move them from one apiary 

 to anothe,. those colonies that you move 

 will be the ones that produce the most 

 honey. You can put them side by side 

 with other colonies that you do not move, 

 they will be no stronger than the ones that 

 you left there and yet when you come to 

 count up the results, the colonies that j'ou 

 move are the honey producers. 



Mr. Root — I am interested in what Mr. 

 BoWen says. I want to know why he 

 should have had that experience. I find 

 paper around the hives is a good thing^but 

 I have also found that more packing is 

 better. My experience is, as Mr. Dadant 

 says, almost every year we have hives with 

 the single walls. At, a rule those colonies 

 are so weak that they are good for nothing. 

 We watch them in the spring. I have had 

 numbers of those single wall hive colonies, 

 good colonies, and we lose them every year. 

 But I find this, year in and year out, that 

 the unpacked colony without the paper, is 

 either very weak or very bad. Some of 

 them pull through, because there are always 

 exceptions to prove the rule. I believe 

 they have more sunshine. 



Mr. Bowen — Excuse me, I say there were 

 some that we never put the paper on. 



Mr. Root — That is worse and more of 

 it. Our experience is exactly that of Mr. 

 Dadant; our colonies that are packed are 

 so much better in the spring than those 

 without it. It is a little dangerous to let 

 the dogma go out that it is safe sometimes 

 not to pack. 



I have not any silk hat. Dr. Miller 

 used to say, "I would like to bet Mr. 

 Bowen a silk hat that if he packed sonie 

 of his colonies and not pack the other, if 

 he did not find his packed colonies in con- 

 siderably better shape, I will buy him the 

 best silk hat he can get in Chicago or 

 anywhere else. 



Mr. Pellett — There is one thing you 

 ought not to lose sight of in these dis- 

 cussions about the unpacked colonies, and 

 that is the fact that while the colony may 

 go through the winter, it is so much weaker 

 in bees. It is important not only to save 

 the colony, but to save just as many bees 

 as possible, and I believe, from my limited 

 experience, that the packed colonies come - 

 through at least 25 per cent stronger in 



bees and yet, as these gentlemen said, there 

 are some very extraordinary cases. For 

 instance, last spring I bought some colonies 

 and put them in old hives that were so 

 rotten you could practically put two fingers 

 through the top of the cover and those 

 bees were all right, in spite of the hard 

 winter we had last winter. 



The President — There wa^ plenty of ven- 

 tilation. They were open to the weather. 



Mr. Bowen — One thing ought to be 

 taken into consideration about this going 

 through the winter. I believe bees ought 

 to take their flights every ten days or two 

 weeks and they will winter in better shape 

 than those that do not go out. Where 

 you have those thick walled hives they are 

 not so apt to fly. 



You remember Dr. Phillips told us of 

 his experience, that the packed hives got 

 just as cold as the other but do not warm 

 up so quickly. 



The President — I will say this further, 

 that my chaff hives come out in the 

 spring stronger in bees, they consume less 

 stores, have more brood than my double 

 wall with dead air space, or my single 

 wall with dead air around them. I have 

 less colonies in proportion in chaff hives 

 than I have in the other hives. 



Mr. Coppin — Mr. Bowen's argument 

 will hardly hold out. He says we know 

 that the double wall hive will not warm 

 up as quick. If it will not warm up so 

 quick, it will not get cold so quick. I have ■ 

 noticed in the bulletin from Washington | 

 they recommend wintering in the two 

 story hive. 



\ 



WEDNESDAY EVENING SESSION. 



The meeting was called to order at 

 7:30 p. m. in the banquet room of the 

 Leland Hotel. The Vice President, Dr. 

 Baxter, in the chair. 



The Chairman — Ladies and gentlemen, 

 we are very fortunate to have with us 

 this evening Mr. Frank C. Pellett of Iowa. 



Mr. Pellett — When a country is as large 

 as this, there is a great range of condi- 

 tions, a wide difference in methods of 

 manipulation, stores of honey and general 

 practice. The methods that are adapted to 

 the north are not adapted to the south and 

 one has to have a quite extensive observa- 

 tion before one can appreciate how much 

 of the bee-keeping industry is capable of 

 being expanded, how much of a business 

 it may become. You know here in Iowa 

 and Illinois, where you and I live, most of 

 our people are so busy raising corn and hogs 

 that they have never thought it possible 

 that such an insignificant creature as a 



