May. 1913. 



16S 



Amc^rican Vee Jonrnal 



plan without taking,' into account that very 

 important item, the season. In a very good 

 season, especially with a eood, late flow, re- 

 sults would be very different from results 

 in a year with so meager a flow as to supply 

 the bees only enough for their daily needs. 

 In brief, your plan is to have 20 colonies de- 

 vote themselves entirely to storing without 

 swarming, and then at the close of the 

 clover and basswood to furnish brood for 30 

 or 40 nuclei. In the first place, it's dollars to 

 doughnuts that those 20 colonies will not go 

 through the harvest without swarming. By 

 the time the flow is over there will be a let- 

 up in brood-rearing, and if you find as much 

 as five brood in each hive you will do well. 

 That would bring your nuclei up to some- 

 thing like three brood each. If a good flow 

 continues late from fall flowe_rs. each one 

 may become a full colony with plenty of 

 stores. Feeding might be resorted to. but 

 somehow bees don't breed up as well with 

 your feeding as they do when they can help 

 themselves in the fields, So you see it de- 

 pends greatly upon the season. 

 2. It should work all right. 



Plans of Increase 



I am struck by thu item in the American 

 Bee Journal. December. 1M12. page )7t). under 

 the heading. "Making Increase." Why 

 would not this do in place of shook swarm- 

 ing, when one did not mind increase? I did 

 something like this in iui2. and it was as fol- 

 lows; In the case of a 10-frame hive I took 

 away i<!) five frames, some of which had 

 queen-cells, and put these on a near stand, 

 y. c. the colony without queen, and left the 

 " parent" colony {/'i on the old stand. I filled 

 up both with frames with foundation. I took 

 42 sections from 7m the parent colony with 

 the original queen The other colony with 

 the queen-cells did nothing except to fill up 

 the brood-chamber; things always looked' 

 very quiet about {,!]. and when uniting this 

 colony with another, it was found with a 

 queen. 



On pages 310 and ui. October, i'ji2, issue, 

 you answered my question about nuclei. 

 Could a person, in our latitude, have queens 

 ready from nuclei to usewithsuch a method 

 of increase as per page 376 ? You will no- 

 tice I left the parent colony on the old 

 stand, while the New York man. page i7b, 

 put the original queen on two frames on a 

 new stand. Pennsvlv.^nia. 



Answer.— Your letters always interest 

 me. First, because they show intelligent 

 thinking, and second because they have the 

 interest of puzzles. You're a very rapid 

 penman, so rapid that some of your words 

 are nearly a straight, horizontal line made a 

 a little wavy. No doubt you can easily read 

 them when first written, but by the time 

 they get this far from home, in zero weather, 

 they make quite a puzzle. I'm conceited 

 enough to think that in most cases I've made 

 the right guess; but I feel sorry for the 

 printer. 



If I've interpreted you correctly, I think 

 you are a little in error as to New York's 

 plan. You seem to think that he puts the 

 old queen on a new stand, whereas he in- 

 tends " to increase by taking a frame or two 

 from the old hive with old queen, and place 

 the same in a new hive on the old stand." 

 Later he says the old hive on the new stand 

 will be queenless. So he leaves the old 

 queen on the old stand, just as I understand 

 you do. 



In the shake-swarm plan all. or nearly all. 

 the brood is taken from the old stand, and 

 all. or nearly all. the bees are left on the old 

 stand. New York's plan varies from the 

 shake-swarm plan in that he takes away 



from the old stand nearly all the younger 

 bees. Yours varies in that you leave half 

 the brood on the old stand. 'Which plan is 

 better to use depends upon circumstances. 

 Your plan is perhaps the best of the three // 

 you can be sure the bees will not swarm 

 later on. But in too many cases I think the 

 colony willswarm a little later with so many 

 combs of brood left with the old queen. 

 New York's plan will leave the two colonies 

 somewhat equal in strength, and in case 

 there is a heavy late flow he may get a good 

 surplus from each. But in an ordinary sea- 

 son with surplus only from the early flow. 

 New York may get no surplus from either, 

 while a shake-swarm might have a good 

 surplus. 



You should be able to rear queens early 

 enough for these plans, although you will 

 have none too much time for it. 



anything. You will probably be wise not to 

 try it on a very large scale at first. 



European Foul Brood in Honey and Super Combs 



1. Would combs that have never contained 

 brood be affectetl in any way. even if they 

 had been drawn out by colonies affected 

 with European foul brood ? Would it be 

 safe to use any of those combs ? Now I 

 have 200 self-spacing shallow extracting 

 frames all drawn-out combs. They have 

 been exposed to the diseased colonies, but 

 not used for brood-rearing. The diseased 

 colonies had stored honey in them, and I ex- 

 tracted it. Would it be all right to use 

 them, or would it be better to make wax out 

 of them ? Everybody's bees are affected 

 around here, as one of the bee-keepers left 

 his hives out to be cleaned up where bees 

 had died. 



2. Is the honey stored by colonies affected 

 with European foul brood diseased, or in 

 what way is the disease carried ? 



Michigan. 



Answers.— I. I have used such combs 

 without bad results. Whether it would 

 always work so well I cannot say. If I had 

 never had the disease I should not want to 

 use them. But in your case, with the dis- 

 ease all around you. and having already 

 been in your apiary, I should not hesitate to 

 use them. The likelihood is that it will be 

 some time before you are entirely rid of 

 European foul brood, but it will gradually 

 become less troublesome. and will not hin- 

 der you from getting crops of honey. 



2. 1 don't know. I ///i/^k surplus honey 

 stored by diseased colonies is free from the 

 disease, although there may be exceptions. 

 At any rate. I fed such honey in a number 

 of cases without finding any bad results. I 

 should not feel so safe about honey in the 

 brood-chamber. 



Glass for Super-Covers 



I have noticed two or three times in the 

 Bee Journal, bee-keepers using a sheet of 

 glass for a super cover. I would like to 

 adopt it myself if it would be advisable, but 

 before deciding would like to have your 

 opinion for and against its use. 



I now have 8 colonies in the back-yard 

 (live in townj. 4 in divisible brood-chamber 

 hives, and 4 in different styles of hives that 

 they were bought in. I expect to use the 

 divisible hive altogether. Two colonies, 

 last season, yielded 80 pounds, and were in- 

 creased to 5. Pennsylvania. 



Answer. — Some have reported success in 

 using glass over the brood-chamber, espe- 

 cially in England, while others object to it. 

 I'm not sure what the objection is. but sup- 

 pose there would be trouble with vapor con- 

 densing on the glass and dropping down 

 upon the bees. The advantage is that you 

 can see through the glass, yet there is not 

 so very much to be seen without lifting out 



Making Increase — Robbers 



1. I have a few colonies of black bees, and 

 I wish to requeen them with Italian queens. 

 I have two coloniesot select tested Italians 

 from which I want to save queens to do 

 this, and I do not want to interfere with 

 their swarming. Must I cut out the queen- 

 cells I wish to use in nuclei before they 

 swarm or after ? 



2. Do you think it is best to put queens in 

 nuclei until they become fertilized, or put 

 on cell-protectors in parent colony and in- 

 troduce as virgin queens ? 



3. Last summer I cut a bee-tree and 

 secured a fine swarm of Italians, with a 

 fine looking queen. I put it in an 8-frame 

 hive, and in a few weeks I examined it and 

 It had six frames of capped brood, and the 

 other two frames very nearly full. In a few 

 days I noticed the bees dragging out their 

 young, and every morning the ground would 

 be covered with young bees not quite large 

 enough to fly. I opened the hive and found 

 they were tearing the combs to pieces and 

 had nearly all the brood out of the combs; 

 the queen was still in the hive and seemed 

 to be in good condition. In a few weeks 

 more I opened the hive again and found 

 only a handful of bees— queen and bees had 

 disappeared. They were within a few feet 

 of the kitchen door, and I do not think they 

 coul have left without some of us hearing 

 them. Can you tell me what was the matter ? 



4. Do you think it will be safe for me to 

 use these frames of comb in another colony 

 this spring? Missouri. 



Answers.— I. When the colony swarms 

 the cells will be entirely too immature to 

 use. as the swarm generally issues at about 

 the time the first cell is sealed, and it is 

 best to cut the cells as mature as possible, 

 say a day or so before time for the virgins 

 to emerge. When the swarm issues, hive it 

 on a new stand, and do nothing more to 

 weaken the mother colony. Then the bees 

 will be pretty sure to make preparations for 

 after-swarming. You can make more sure 

 of this if you return part of the bees, in- 

 stead of leaving the whole swarm with the 

 old queen. In six or seven days after the 

 prime swarm, put your ear against the side 

 of the old hive each evening, until you hear 

 the piping of the young queens. This will 

 likely be about the eighth day. When you 

 hear it, go to the hive the next morning and 

 cut out (/// cells, for the piping queen is 

 already out of the cell. Look sharp as you 

 cut out the cells, or some of the virgins will 

 emerge before you know it. 



2. Better leave them in nuclei until they 

 are laying. 



3. I don't know. The only way I can ac- 

 count for the combs being torn is that rob- 

 bers did it. They might also drag out the 

 young bees, leaving the queen, at least for a 

 time. Yet it seems very strange that a 

 colony strong enough to have six brood 

 combs should have been overcome by rob- 

 bers. Perhaps theji were starving. 



4. If my guess is right that the combs were 

 torn up by robbers, then it will be safe to 

 use them again. 



Balling Queens Spacing Frames lor Winter 



1. Will bees ball or kill their ciueen when 

 they are drummed from a box-hive in trans- 

 ferring ? 



2. With a regular brood-chamber and a 

 winter case made of ?'&-inch lumber, is 1I2 

 inches on sides and ends and 8 inches on 

 top. enough for safe wintering ? 



New York. 

 I. I never heard of a case of the kind; al- 

 though it would be nothing surprising if it 

 should occasionally happen. Bees some 



"Buying Cheap Goods to Save Money is Like Stopping tlie Clocit to Save Time" 

 It Pays to Buy LEWIS BEEWARE — Always the Same — 4lv»ays Standard 



Send for Annual Catalog nhioli nill tell 

 you n ho is your nearest Distributer. 

 G. B. I^ewis Company. Watertown, A\*ls, 



