Jan. 21, 1904. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



39 



to practice a method that takes more time, and this has al- 

 ways been successful with me. 



PERFORATED SEPARATORS — SUPBR-ROOM. 



Now, I want to say to Mr. A. F. Foote, page 767, that I 

 have used sawed separators with holes in them, cut with a 

 sharp point of a jack-knife, quite extensively for two or 

 three seasons. If the holes are too large the bees will some- 

 times bulge the face of the sections opposite the holes ; if 

 the holes are too small the bees will endeavor to fill them 

 with propolis. Occasionally I have found sections attached 

 to the separators, but not many. My opinion is, that the 

 holes are not much of an advantage anyway, and no great 

 disadvantage. 



In answer to his question whether it pays to use separa- 

 tors I would say. Use them, every time. Owing to a short- 

 age of the supply this season I was compelled to have a 

 good deal of the honey stored in sections without separators, 

 and want no more of it. No, sir, you did not give your bees 

 plenty of super-room. My bees, this season, built lots of 

 comb where it should not have been, and all because of lack 

 of super-room. I could not get sections when needed, al- 

 though I kept telegrams and letters flying in every direc- 

 tion, and the consequence was that supering to a degree that 

 would answer the requirement of the bees was simply im- 

 possible. My losses on this account were several hundred 

 dollars. I had to traverse the yard day after day, from 

 early morning until sunset, finding where the pressure was 

 greatest, and contriving means for temporary relief, then 

 go to bed and lay awake a good share of the night trying to 

 think of some new expedient, and solacing myself with the 

 hope that the mail would bring me, next day, a letter from 

 some supply-dealer that he had sent me something. But I 

 had to see many days come and go by with many hives and 

 supers filled to the brim right in the midst of the heaviest 

 honey-flow known for years, and not a thing to give the 

 bees to store in. 



SPRING FEEDING OF BEES. 



I wrote, last spring, that I was feeding 100 colonies of 

 bees. At the opening of the honey-flow, late in May, the 

 number had been reduced to 90 colonies. The losses were 

 due mainly to loss of queens, and consequent doubling up. 

 One colony I lost by starvation in spite of my watchfulness, 

 and one colony I lost by fire. 



Right here, I will pause to say to Mr. Hasty that the let- 

 alones are welcome to smile the year around at the way I 

 fed my bees last spring. In consequence of this feeding I 

 had rousing colonies of bees ready to do big work in an un- 

 limited field carpeted with white clover bloom. 



SWARMING AN EVERY-DAY OCCURRENCE. 



Swarming commenced about June 1, and was an every- 

 day occurrence from that time until the middle of July. 

 From 1 to IS swarms had to be cared for every day, and 

 there were 250 in all. The expedients for caring for all of 

 these swarms were as many as those for keeping the hives 

 supered with insufficient supplies, but my losses were in- 

 significant when swarms would issue, and sometimes 2 or 3 

 would issue at a time, and at a time when there was not a 

 thing in sight to hive them in. Persons around me would 

 be flying around in an exciting way asking, what I was go- 

 ing to do now. I would just say to one, you do this, and to 

 another you do that, and we'll take them in, and we did. 

 The 250 swarms were hived in a little less than 90 hives. 

 The rush and roar of these great masses of bees in the mid- 

 dle of a hot afternoon was terrific. A timid person had no 

 business in the yard. 



Of course, many of the colonies thus made proved to be 

 queenless, and these queenless colonies have been united 

 with other colonies. Many times I would find a ball of bees 

 soon after hiving 2 or 3 swarms together, and then I would 

 release a queen, cage her under a glass tumbler, give Vier 

 a bit of honey, put a hairpin under the edge of the tumbler, 

 and keep her until I saw a colony where the bees seemed to 

 want a queen. 



One morning, rather early, I thought the cry came that 

 a swarm was clustering on a small branch of a small plum- 

 tree down at the lower end of the yard. I went down with 

 a hive, and found the bees so low down that I set the hive 

 on the ground and shook the bees from the limb. Some 

 went into the hive, and some returned to the limb, but be- 

 fore half of the bees could be gotten into the hive, anotlier 

 swarm clustered on the same limb, or mingled with the bees 

 that were entering. This thing was kept up until 10 

 swarms had come to the same spot. I would fill a hive with 

 bees, take it away, and then fill another. I think I run the 

 10 swarms into 7 hives. 



The freaks of swarming where there was so much of it 

 are too numerous to mention. August 25, a large swarm 

 was seen clustered in a peach-tree. There was just one 

 hive on the premises not in use, but not a single frame or a 

 bit of foundation, so I borrowed 3 frames of sealed honey 

 from other hives and hived the bees on these, letting those 

 that could not cluster on them cling to the sides of the 

 hive and the underside of the cover until frames and foun- 

 dation should arrive, which I felt sure would be next day. 



The next day another large swarm issued, and was said 

 to be clustering where the swarm had clustered the day be- 

 fore. I went to see what could be done, and found the bees 

 going in with the swarm of the day before. What bees 

 could not get in the hive clustered between one side of the 

 hive and a board I had leaned against it for shade. When 

 my supplies came, instead of filling up the hive with frames 

 of foundation, I borrowed more frames of honey from other 

 hives, filled the hive with the swarms with these, put on 

 two supers of sections, and set this great force to storing 

 comb honey. Then the bees that had loaned me the filled 

 frames were set to work drawing out foundation. 



I have another colony which issued as a swarm early 

 in September. I am preserving it because I believe it to be 

 one with a young queen, and young queens do good work 

 the following season. 



I will remark before I forget it, that bee-escapes were 

 not needed in the height of the season. Supers could be 

 set on end anywhere in the yard, and the bees would grad- 

 ually leave them, and other bees would pay them no atten- 

 tion. 



BEST SIZE OF HIVE. 



In the infancy of my bee-keeping days I rashly promised 

 that I would some time give the readers of the American 

 Bee Journal my opinion of the 8-frame dovetail hive. I am 

 reluctant to fulfill the promise because of the fact that com- 

 parisons are sometimes odious. This I will venture to say, 

 that I am still making hives, but am not making any, or 

 many, of that size. If I were a comb-honey producer ex- 

 clusively, like Dr. Miller, and were a younger and stronger 

 man, I might revise my opinion of it. It takes too much 

 watchfulness and too much work for me. I used a good 

 many of them this season, and practiced contraction with 

 some colonies, and got some splendid work done in these ; 

 but the wintering is where the shoe pinches. I am now 

 making the 10-frame dovetail and the Dadant-Blatt hives 

 for my own use. 



RESULTS OF THE SEASON OF 1903. 



Of the financial results of the season's operations it 

 may be well to observe some reticence. The out-goes have 

 been larger, and the incomes smaller, than they would have 

 been if my foresight had been as good as my hindsight. 

 Probably 7 tons of honey, ?j comb, is my share of the plun- 

 der. 



GETTING UNFINISHED SECTIONS CLEANED OUT. 



To Mr. Whitney, who criticised my way of getting un- 

 finished sections cleaned out in the fall, I will respectfully 

 say, that it seems to me that he is not in position to be a 

 fair critic, as he says that he had never tried it in the fall. 

 I have had the work done this fall in the manner before 

 given, and with perfect success. This season I used the 

 uncapping-knife on all sections that had sealed honey, and 

 I was surprised at the rapidity with which the honey went 

 below. I have proved this season that the firmer chisel is 

 an awfully good thing in the bee-yard, but I do not use it 

 for an uncapping-knife. 



I wish Mr. Whitney lived near me, for I have scrip- 

 ture warrant for the belief that we would soon speak face to 

 face. Decatur Co., Iowa, Nov. 30. 



Successful Wintering of Bees on the Sum- 

 mer Stands. 



BY ROBT. A. HOLEKAMP. 



AS under " Editorial Comments," contributions from 

 readers are requested, I will describe my way of win- 

 tering bees on the summer stands, which has proven a 

 success with me, and may be of interest to some who are 

 beginning in bee-culture. 



In the fall, when the supers are off the hives, I examine 

 every colony by lifting the hive, and if I am not certain 

 that an 8-frame dovetailed hive weighs at least 50 pounds, 

 or a 10-frame dovetailed hive 60 pounds, I put it on the 



