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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Aug. 11, 1904. 



lects the outside combs, c. Tulip-tree, honey-dew, persim- 

 mon, and sourwood, in the order named, with the chances 

 that one or several miss every year. d. The tulip-tree about 

 May 10. e. Till July 20. But there are intervals without 

 a flow between these four sources, besides the chances of 

 some missing. 



Dr. C. C. Mili^KR (111 ) — a. 8. b. I'd do some studying 

 whether to have 8 or 10, inclining to 8 if feeling vigorous 

 enough for the extra work, and to 10 if feeling a little lazy, 

 c. Chiefly white clover, with some fall flow. d. About June 

 1 comes first bloom with flow 10 days later, e. The flow 

 lasts from two to three weeks to as many months. Some- 

 times blossoms are plentiful with no nectar. 



P. H. Ei.woOD (N. Y.)— a. We use about 2200 square 

 inches of comb surface with Italians ; 2500 would be better 

 with Carniolans and some of the other races. We change 

 the capacity to meet the capacity of the queen, b. The 

 same. c. White clover with alsike ; basswood and buck- 

 wheat, d. White and alsike clover about the middle of 

 June ; basswood about July 10 ; buckwheat about Aug. 1. 

 e. Occasionally the bloom is continuous through the season, 

 but I never knew the yield of honey to be continuous. If 

 we get three to four weeks of good honey weather we are 

 fortunate ; sometimes much less. 



E. Whitcomb (Nebr.)— a. 8. b. 8. c. Sweet clover, 

 white clover, and heartsease, d. April 30 for sweet clover ; 

 white clover follows, and heartsease about Aug. 1, and con- 

 tinues till frost, e. Sweet clover of the yellow variety lasts 

 till July 1, when the white comes into bloom and lasts till 

 after the first frosts. White clover begins blooming about 

 June 1, and, under favorable conditions, lasts well toward 

 fall. Usually, however, dry weather catches it during 

 August. Heartsease begins blooming about Aug. 1, and 

 lasts till frosts. The most productive in nectar is that 

 variety which comes up in the stubble-fields after the har- 

 vest is cut. We have two varieties, the upland and swamp 

 heartsease. 



c 



Contributed Articles 



) 



Rearing Thousands of Queens from One 

 Colony. 



BY G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



A CORRESPONDENT wishes me to tell the readers of 

 the American Bee Journal how I rear queens. To go 

 into all the minutia of the matter would take up all the 

 room in several issues of the American Bee Journal, and 

 were I disposed to do this the Editor would not allow it. 

 Therefore, I have referred the correspondent to the pages 

 of " Scientific Queen-Rearing," which explains the whole 

 thing ; and I will in this tell, briefly, how to work a colony, 

 as is given in full in the book, so that thousands of queens 

 can be reared from the same, this colony having a laying 

 queen in it all the time. 



When spring opens I select one of the strongest colo- 

 nies I have in the apiary, the same having a queen of the 

 previous season's rearing, as this colony should have a 

 queen that is not likely to fail in her egg-laying ability dur- 

 ing the season, as the laying ot the queen below has much 

 to do with the perfection of the queens reared above, in my 

 opinion. 



About the middle of May I go to other colonies in the 

 apiary, and take frames of emerging brood to the number 



needed to take the place of those in this hive, having no 

 brood in them, which is generally from one to three. These 

 beeless combs of brood are now set iti the hive, when in a 

 week or ten days I have a colony strong enough to com- 

 mence operations. 



As soon as the colony is strong enough to go into the 

 upper story profitably, I go to some hive in the bee-yard 

 that can spare them, and get two frames having mostly 

 eggs and unsealed larva- in the comb. Or, if the colony is 

 a little weak, take these two frames of unsealed brood from 

 their hive and set in their places two frames of emerging 

 brood from other colonies. This will strengthen the colony 

 still further, and make it stronger earlier in the season. I 

 now put on top of this hive containing the prepared strong 

 colony, a hive having a queen -excluder nailed to the bottom 

 of it, so that if we need to look into the hive below after- 

 ward, the excluder will lif t ofi" with the upper hive. Having 

 the upper hive and excluder in place, the two combs of un- 

 sealed brood are placed in the center, and four frames well 

 filled with honey are placed two on either side of these, 

 making six frames in all. The rest of the hive is filled out 

 with dummies, except the place left for the division-board 

 feeder used in feeding, at all times when the flowers are 

 not yielding nectar. 



E. R. Root and others partition off the hive having the 

 strong colony, with excluders, instead of using an upper 

 story ; but from a trial of the matter for several years, I 

 obtain the best results with the upper story. However, the 

 principle of the partitioned ofl' part is the same as the upper 

 story, and fully as good queens can be reared ; but with 

 me not so many of the prepared cell-cups are accepted as in 

 the upper story. 



When about two days have elapsed for the new colony 

 to adjust itself to the new conditions, it is ready for a batch 

 of prepared cell-cups, as given in the book. To tell all 

 about how to prepare these would be altogether too long for 

 this article, and I must refer the reader for this part to the 

 book. And lest this is thought to be for an advertisement, 

 I wish to say that the publishers of the American Bee Jour- 

 nal have full control of the book, sale and all, and I have 

 nothing to do with it.' I write this article only by request 

 of the correspondent. 



To return : Before going for the needed royal jelly 

 and the larva- to transfer into it, I stop at the prepared hive, 

 take out one of the dummies, shove the frames that way till 

 I leave a frame's space between the combs of brood, when 

 the cover is put on again. As a rule, it takes me from 15 to 

 20 minutes to get the royal jelly, the larvae, put the jelly 

 and larva" into the cell-cups, and take the now prepared 

 frame to the prepared hive. 



On now opening the hive I find the prepared space left 

 for the frame of prepared cell-cups filled with bees, all 

 clustered in there, often so closely that I have to work the 

 frame slowly up and down in lowering it into the hive, thus 

 causing the bees to run out of the way. I speak of this, 

 not only to show how strong the colony should be to rear 

 good queens, but I believe that this clustering has quite a 

 little to do with their being better prepared with royal jelly, 

 and for queen-rearing, than they would be did I leave the 

 providing of this space till I came with the cell-cups already 

 prepared for insertion. 



Three days later I go to the hive again, take out 

 another dummy, draw the frames toward that part of the 

 hive from which it is taken till I come to the frame of 

 brood, when I lift the frame of cells, take oflf one or two of 

 them for the royal jelly needed in starting the next batch 

 of cells, when the frame of cells is placed in the vacant 

 space behind the frame of brood, caused by taking out the 

 dummy and drawing the others along, thus preparing the 



