April, igit 



American Hee Journal 



swarm for increase? Or do you think it 

 would be still better to prevent swarm- 

 ing for this season? I want a good honey 

 crop. 



3. This is my first year in bee-keeping, 

 and last summer was a poor, dry one. 

 so I was glad to put my colonies into 

 winter quarters with full supplies. I fed, 

 last November, about 20 pounds of syrup 

 to each colony so as to be sure to winter 

 them safely. I have them in a dry, under- 

 ground, dark cellar, in doubje-walled 

 hives, with a cushion on top, but no shav- 

 ings Ijetween the single hive and the hood. 

 The cellar is very cold, temperature about 

 50 degrees, and sometimes down to 22, but 

 it has plenty of ventilation. 



Wisconsin. 



Answers. — i. Your plan will work, and 

 it does not matter greatly whether you 

 leave a small entrance above or not. If 

 you do leave one. it will be well to let 

 It face the same way as the entrance be- 

 low, for then it will trouble the bees less 

 about finding the lower entrance when the 

 upper hive is taken away. The likeli- 

 hood is that any queens or cells obtained 

 in this way will be poor, for conditions 

 are not right for rearing giood queens. In 

 the Demaree plan, no entrance is allowed 

 above. 



2. If you can in some way coax your 

 bees not to think of swarming at all, 

 you will get more honey than by having 

 either natural or artificial increase. But 

 that is not an easy thing to do. It is 

 likely that you will get as much or more 

 honey by the plan you propose than by 

 natural swarming. 



3. You are working wisely against mice 

 and otherwise managing well, only I am 

 afraid your bees will come out in bad 

 shape in the spring because the cellar is 

 too cold. The bees must consume so 

 much honey to keep up sufficient heat 

 that their intestines will be overloaded 

 long before it is time for them to be 

 taken out of the cellar. To give them a 

 fair chance, the cellar should in some 

 way be heated up to about 45. 



Swarming — Amount of Stores for 



Winter — Shallow Extracting 



Frames, Etc. 



1. I would like to have as few swarms 

 as possible. What way would be the least 

 labor? 



2. Will it check swarming to remove 

 the old hive and put the new colony in 

 its place? 



3. If I take the supers from the parent 

 colony and put them on the new swarm, 

 will the bees that are in the field keep 

 on working in the super? 



4. Will not the queen go with them ? 



5. Win the bees go through winter with 

 as" small amount of honey as 15 or 20 

 pounds, when in the cellar? 



6. The man I bought my bees from 

 said they were Italians, but I'm not sure 

 they are. Some of them look pretty 

 brown, and have two or three bands, and 

 some are very dark? 



7. I have thought of buying an extract- 

 or. Where do you think I could get it 

 cheapest? How large do you think one 

 needs for about 25 or 50 colonies? 



8. How do the shallow extracting 

 frames work when running for extracted 

 honey? 



9. What is the best way to fasten foun- 

 dation to the top-bars of extracting 

 frames? „ 



10. I have ''A B C & X Y Z of Bee 

 Culture." Would it be well to have more 

 books of that kind? 



11. Would it be any help to me, living 

 in Northern Minnesota, to become a mem- 

 ber of a bee-keepers' association? If so, 

 Which one is the best? Are there any 

 in Minnesota? Minnesot.\. 



Answers. — i. Perhaps the easiest way 



to have as few swarms as possible is to 

 run for extracted honey, and then, just 

 before there is danger of swarming, use 

 the Demaree plan. Put in the second 

 story over an excluder all the brood- 

 combs but one, and in the first story, un- 

 der the excluder, put the queen and one 

 of the combs with least brood, filling up 

 both stories with empty combs or frames 

 of foundation. 



2. Yes, that will do much toward pre- 

 venting a second swarm. A surer plan 

 is to put the swarm on the old stand with 

 the old hive close beside it, and a week 

 later move the old hive to a new stand. 



3. Hardly that, for the field-bees are 

 not the ones that work in the super, but 

 practically so, for the field-bees will all 

 go to the old stand, and the honey will 

 be stored in the supers there. 



3. There is danger of the queen going 

 up if the supers are put on immediately 

 after the swarm is hived, unless a queen- 

 excluder is used. In the absence of an 

 excluder, do not put the supers on for 

 about 2 days, and in that time the queen 

 will have made a start below and will 

 not be likely to go into the super. 



5. In some cases they would, but it 

 would not be safe to risk it. 



6. In a colony of pure Italians, all the 

 workers should have 3 yellow bands, al- 

 though the band toward the head is not 

 very distinct. 



7. I'm not sure whether there is_ any 

 difference in prices. Consult the cata- 

 logue of the dealers. A 2-frame extract- 

 or ought to answer. 



8. Some use them altogether, and they 

 are probably a good bit better than the 

 deeper frames, unless one wants to use 

 them for brood-frames too. 



9. As good a way as any, and a good 

 deal the easiest way, is to use the wedges 

 that are now generally sent out with the 

 frames. Slip the foundation into the 

 larger saw-kerf, and then crowd the 

 wedge-strip into the smaller kerf. In some 

 places, however, there has been complaint 

 that the foundation was not held securely 

 in this way, especially toward the South. 

 In that case, run melted wax along the 

 joint. 



10. Yes, even after you have several 

 of the best books, if a new one appears, 

 even if quite inferior to the others, it 

 may contain some hint that is worth more 

 than the cost of the book. As a second 

 book you will do well to get "Forty Years 

 Among the Bees." 



11. By all means every Minnesota bee- 

 keeper should join the Minnesota State 

 Bee-Keepers' Association. If you become 

 a member of that, I think it makes you 

 also a member of the National Bee-Keep- 

 ers' Association. Write H. V. Poore, 

 Bird Island, Minn. 



A Beginner's Questions 



1. How is salt fed to bees? 



2. How do you water bees in spring? 



3. Will combs that have brood in them 

 spoil honey in any way when it is ex- 

 tracted ? 



4. When transferring bees will it hurt 

 to have the old hive wrongside up until 

 the brood hatches. 



5. Will brood-frames without full sheets 

 of foundation be strong enough for the 

 extractor? 



6. Is it necessary to wire full sheets 

 in shallow extracting frames? 



7. Will bees clean out combs that have 

 had moth in them the previous year? 



8. I have some sections of honey (my 

 first) that have what looks like sawdust 

 in them, and very small holes in the 

 comb in different places, but no sign of 

 moth-worms or galleries in them, so far 

 as I can see. What is it? Robber-bees 

 were at them some. 



9. Wouldn't this plan work for trans- 

 ferring bees? When the bees in box- 



hives swarm, hive them in a hive over 

 the old box, and catch the young queen 

 from the old colony with a queen-trap 

 when she comes out to mate, and kill her 

 and put a queen-excluder between^ 



10. Could I safely introduce a new 

 queen to a swarni hanging to a limb, by 

 killing their queen and placing the new 

 queen on the cluster of bees ? 



11. Will late fall feeding ever spoil the 

 bees' cluster-nest? 



12. Will it be safe to winter bees on 

 combs with nearly all cells partly full of 

 honey, but little or no capped honey? 



13. I see in some of my brood-frames 

 where I wired with full sheets, the bees 

 nut honey in the row of cells that were 

 built over the wires. Is this because I 

 did not get the wire deep enough in the 

 foundation? 



14. Last spring my bees gathered pollen 

 from maple trees (not sugar maple) as 

 soon as it was warm enough for them to 

 fly. Will they need to be fed flour? 



Kansas. 



Answers. — i. It is not often that salt 

 is fed to bees. Some have thought it de- 

 sirable, because in the spring bees are 

 found where salty moisture is to be ob- 

 tained. Others think the bees care only 

 for the moisture, and prefer a place not 

 because the water is salty, but because it 

 is warmer than in other places. The 

 easiest way to give salt to bees is to give 

 it in their drinking water. I have tried 

 salt and fresh water side by side, and 

 never could make out that the bees had 

 any preference. 



2. I get from grocers cork-chips that 

 come as packing in kegs of grapes in 

 winter. I put water in a tub, pail, ot 

 half-barrel, and then put on enough cork- 

 chips so that the water will barely come 

 up through the chips for the bees to get 

 at. Once every week or two I pour in 

 fresh water to fill up what has evapor- 

 ated or has been taken by the bees. No 

 matter if bees are on the cork-chips, if 

 the water is poured on them they will 

 come up smiling. This is by far the best 

 arrangement I have ever tried. Short 

 sticks of firewood put in the water does 

 pretty well. 



3. Some think it darkens the color of 

 very light honey; but others think it 

 makes no difference. Anyhow, the dif- 

 ference cannot be much. 



4. No. 



5. Yes, but they must be carefully han- 

 dled when they are new. Extract one 

 side partly, reverse and extract the sec- 

 ond side, and then finish the first side. 

 Even then you may have a breakdown. 



6. You can get along without the wir- 

 ing if you are careful enough. 



7. Yes, and make good work of it if 

 the combs are not too far gone. 



8. What looks like sawdust is probably 

 the chippings of comb left by the rob- 

 bers, and there may also be some grains 

 of honey if the honey was candied. 



9. If I understand the plan correctly, 

 I don't believe it would be satisfactory. 



10. It might succeed sometimes. 



11. Yes. 



12. Not very safe, but it might succeed. 



13. I suspect you mean that brood is 

 in the other cells, and honey in the cells 

 over the wires. I don't know, but think 

 it might be because the wire is not deep 

 enough. 



14. No, with plenty of soft, or red, ma- 

 ples, they will need no substitute for 

 pollen. 



Management for Increase — Italian 

 Bees 



I. I have only one colony of bees, but 

 I got 20 pounds of honey from them last 

 year, which I call, for the amount of bees, 

 and in this vicinity, fairly well. I am 

 thinking of buying s more colonies. Would 

 you advise me to divide them in the 



