446 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Sept. 



wood, and concluded our best thing to do is 

 to get to work and raise more trees for both 

 honey and lumber, for the great unknown 

 generations of bee-keepers in the future. 



FKIKNB ClIIIiDS' SECRET. 



HOW TO PREVENT NEW SWARMS FROM ABSCONDING. 



M'OW, "Uncle," were you over so hurried that 

 you had not time to he honest? Well, that 

 — ' " has been my fix since I received those sepa- 

 rators, until now; but I have thought of it, and 

 would think I could get timeto-mornnv, and so time 

 sped on. It is raining to-day, and I am not sorry, 

 for it gives me time to pay you, and also to make up 

 a lot of fdn., which I needed \ery much, but could 

 not make it while the bees could fly, for they would 

 not only get into the melted wax, but would swarm 

 and swarm again, and I am tired of it, with cutting 

 outqueen-cells, and putting back second swarms, and 

 still they come just when I want to do something 

 else. I am up, generally, before four in the mcrn- 

 ing, and busy until eight in the evening, hiving 

 them, cutting out queen-cells, then putting back 

 the swarms, taking off boxes and filling in others, 

 tacking in separators, putting up boxes, fixing up 

 stands for bees, etc. Oh! by the way, let me tell 

 you one secrect, so "keep dark." 



When you have a very heavy swarm, you just put 

 them inside of a large box, like a dry-goods box, 

 with a portico two inches wide, the length of the 

 front of your hive. Kaise It high enough for the 

 bees to go under; fix a good alighting-board and a 

 good cover (I use loose bottom and cover); now set 

 your swarm in, as soon as hived; if the weather is 

 warm, do not have more than two thicknesses of 

 burlap over them; now turn your cover over so that 

 it will not cover more than one-half of the burlap; 

 put on a little strip of a board on the other edge of 

 the burlap, to hold the edge down ; let them be for 

 a few days, and that swarm will stay; at least, I 

 never had one leave that was in that shape, and I 

 have hived hundreds in that way. I make my out- 

 side boxes, then they are all ready to pack the chaff 

 in, in September. 



I have never tried cellar wintering. I try to have 

 hives and outside boxes on hand when needed, but I 

 van out last Friday, and had 7 swarms that day — 

 had no outside boxes for three, but left the covers 

 partly off, and the burlap. I tried to shade some 

 with boards, but one swarmed out the next day. I 

 then hived them and covered them, and they were 

 all O. K. They made a straight walk for the woods 

 when they swarmed out, but they ran against my 

 sheet on a pole, and concluded to turn and alight on 

 the nearest apple-tree. 



A DECOY FOR SM'ARMS. 



My bees now have a choice of what tree to alight 

 on. Many alight on apple-trees, some on currant- 

 bushes, two In some brush I had piled, some on a 

 little cedar-tree, one on a basswood, and one on 

 corn; but the "captain" Is a little balsam-tree not 

 much higher than I can reach. I took some little 

 dead branches and tied them in a bunch about the 

 size of a small swarm of bees; they have turned 

 yellow, and you could not tell them a little way off 

 from a swarm, and they have fairly rushed for that 

 tree, and I can not tell the number I have hived 

 from it. 



I have been very lucky in securing the swarms. I 

 have had only two that mixed together. 1 have 

 managed, with flag and sheet, to keep them apart. 



Amherst, Wis., July 29, 1882. J. Childs. 



As I understand it, tlie " secret " seems to 

 be ill keeping the sun from the hive, and 

 giving the new colony plenty of air. Very 

 likely, many new swarms abscond because 

 their quarters are too warm and close. They 

 pant for the leafy shade and the cool breezes 

 of the forest. The matter of decoys for 

 swarms was much talked about several 

 years ago, when friend Jones's automatic 

 swarnier was up before us. Friend Childs, 

 with your decoy tree you could make the 

 Jones swarnier a success, without doubt. 

 Just fix it on a balanced pole ; and when a 

 swarm alights on it, it will dump them down 

 before the hive prepared for them, just as 

 surely as '' falling off a log." 



THE POOREST SEASON IN 17 YEARS IN 



MASSACHUSETTS. 



ALSO SOME OF FRIEND POND'S OBSERVATIONS AND 

 CONCLUSIONS. 



^jnjpl^ URING seventeen years' experience in keep- 

 JsyJ I ing bees, I have never seen so bad a season 



for surplus as the present. I put six good 



colonies into winter quarters, on their summer 

 stands, in single-walled hives, and they all came out 

 strong in the spring. Spring opened favorably, but 

 the prospects of an early season were soon changed. 

 Fruit-bloom was two weeks late, and j'ielded but lit- 

 tle honey. By stimulative feeding, the production 

 of brood was kept up, in order that stocks might be 

 very strong, when white clover, which is the main 

 stay in this section, came into bloom. Exoeedingly 

 di-y weather and cold nights until the middle of July 

 prevented comb-building to any extent, and for that, 

 or some other reason, clover did not seem to yield 

 any nectar at all. The result is that my colonies are 

 all very strong; yet, Avhile they have gathered stores 

 enough to nearly winter them, no surplus has been 

 obtained; in fact, the bees could not be induced to 

 work in surplus boxes at all, even whea put in the 

 sides of the brood-chamber. Brood sufficient to en- 

 able mc to at least double my colonics was produced, 

 but the attempt to fertilize queens has proved a 

 failure, owing to the bees killing off the drones as 

 fast as they were hatched. I tried for 36 days to 

 havequeeus meet drones; but although they flew out 

 every day, they came back virgins still. I am not, 

 however, a candidate for the " Blasted Hopes" col- 

 umn, by any means; for I shall continue on, hoping 

 that the next season will give me my turn. The 

 pleasure I receive in working ia my little apiary is 

 compensation, although I confess I should be better 

 satisfied with something a little more substantial. 



THE POLLEN FROM THE MILKWEED. 



1 have noticed'my bees of late dragging out of 

 their hives every bee that came home crippled with 

 pollen from milkweed. This I have never before 

 seen, neither have I heard or read any mention of 

 it. Whether It is an unusual thing or not, I do not 

 know; but if usual, I should suppose that some one 

 would have seen and written of it ere this. The 

 bees seemed to have as great an antipathy to these 

 poor crippled sisters of theirs as they would to a 

 robber bee ; and as this same condition of things ex- 



i 



