76 



SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL EEPORT OF THE 



Mr. Wheeler— Is that the object in 

 dividing and spreading? 



The President — I don't spread the 

 combs. I simply put ofrithis second hive 

 body, and use foundation and enough 

 combs to get the queens started up above, 

 with sufficient honey to keep them from 

 starving. 



Mr. Kanneberg — iNIr. President, haven't 

 you found that sometimes the queen will 

 go up in the top of the hive and leave the 

 lower one all empty after the brood is 

 out? 



The President — That is just why I used 

 foundation in the second hive body." 



INIr. Kanneberg — I have done that same 

 thing, and after awhile when I looked at 

 my lower hive there was fio brood, queen 

 or anything there. They all went up in 

 the top of the hive. 



The President — Did you put sheets of 

 foundation in your top hive, or did you 

 put in brood combs? 



Mr. Kanneberg — I put brood comb in. 



The President— That is where the trou- 

 bles comes. 



Mr. Kanneberg — I see it is. 



Mr. H. T. Fisher— What is the idea of 

 the queen excluder and the paper? 



The President— The paper is to keep 

 them from fighting. Along the latter 

 part of August, especiallj' when it gets a 

 little cool, you put two colonies together 

 and they will fight and kill the queens, 

 and kill a lot of the bees. 



Mr. Fisher — I mean a que^en excluder. 



The President— To keep the queen 

 down where she belongs. Another point: 

 If eight frames are used in a ten frame 

 super it will save you a large amount of 

 labor. It is very much easier to uncap 

 than if ten frames are used. 



Mr. Haan— There is another point I 

 would like to touch upon in regard to 

 swarming, and that is this: How do you 

 manage from the beginning of the season 

 until the swarming season stops, to keep 

 your bees from swarming? 



The President-^The secret of non- 

 swarming is to give the queen plenty of 

 room to lay her eggs, and the bees plenty 

 of room to store honey. Give her twenty 

 frames, if she needs them, and plenty 

 of room to store the honey. 



Mr. Wheeler— That is a point I have 

 been studying for several years, thirty or 

 forty years, maybe. That is a point, I 

 am afraid you are mistaken along that 

 line, because it is your locality that hdps 

 you out on the swarming question. In 

 Illinois we have to do something besides 

 give them more room. We can put on all 

 the supers we please, and all the combs we 



please, and when they get ready to swarm, 

 they will swarm in spite of all we can do. 

 I know a man living out at DeKalb, a 

 Mr. Teder, a very successful bee-keeper, 

 and one of the things he does is to pre- 

 vent swarming. He told me that for 

 years he got along without any swaiming. 

 I said, "How do you manage?" "Oh," 

 he would say, "I don't know. I just put 

 on supers and I don't have trouble with 

 the swarms." The other day I met him, 

 and said, "I know that a mere process 

 won't keep bees from swarming. I have 

 been reading a good deal lately about 

 spreading the brood-combs," "Do j'^ou 

 keep on the same amount of brood comb 

 the year around, or do you spread your 

 combs?" "Yes," he said, "I spread my 

 combs in the spring, about the first of 

 June. I believe that is the secret of it."' 

 I believe there is a lot in the spreading of 

 the combs in the broodnest. 



The President — Mr. Dadant I believe 

 was expected to have a paper here at this 

 meeting, in regard to that. His claim is 

 that by spacing his combs wider apart 

 there will be less tendency towards swarm- 

 ing. 



Mr. Stewart — I want every hive of bees 

 that I own to swarm at the beginning of 

 the honey flow. 



I have killed the queen, and I have 

 stopped bi'oodiug for eighteen days, and 

 if there is aiiy honey, I get it. 



Mr. Haan — Mr. President, I would like 

 to outline a sort of a system that I ran this 

 year. I don't know whether anybody else 

 would be interested or -not, but last spring 

 of course I couldn't do anything in the 

 way of increasing. I made very little 

 increase. When a colony prepares to 

 swarm in the springtime, I usually divide 

 them by setting an empty comb in the 

 bottom and a week later setting the top 

 colony away somewhere to a new stand. 

 That will give the colony I set aside a 

 chance to make a new queen for them- 

 selves, and the old colony has the old 

 queen. The old queen is building up on 

 one comb and the rest foundation. It will 

 be quite a long time before she gets ready 

 there to deposit any honey or raise much 

 of a brood. Perhaps by that time the 

 honey flow will be on. Well, now, the new 

 . queen from the top isn't so likely to swarm 

 that season any more, but the old queen 

 may again swarm. Now I have taken the 

 old queen away, that is during the honey 

 season, she wouldn't be needed there 

 anyway, and have started a nucleus with 

 her. By the time that you would have a 

 new queen the honey flow would be about 

 over, and I have let them go that way. 



