S90 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



June 15 



us must be left queenless at least 24 hours, 

 while the cell is introduced within an hour 

 after the laying queen is removed. 



That a laying queen on one side of the di- 

 vision will draw bees from the other side, I 

 surely think is a mistake, as I have mated 

 over TOGO queens in twin boxes, and never 

 saw that happen; and I am thoroughly con- 

 vinced that, to go back to single nuclei, would 

 be a long stride in the wrong direction. 



Medina, Ohio. 



HOW TO SATISFY THE BEES IN THEIR DE- 

 SIRE TO SWARM, AND YET KEEP 

 THEM AT WORK. 



The Shaken-swarm Plan Without Much Increase. 



BY A. J. HALTER, 



Bees that make preparations for swarm- 

 ing will lessen their activity as soon as 

 queen-cells are started. This has a tenden- 

 cy to make the queen gradually ease up on 

 laying until a swarm is ready to come out. 

 The time occui)ied in anticii)ation often 

 varies in accordance with weather condi- 

 tions, the strain of bees, the age of the 

 queen, strength of colony, yield of nectar, 

 the amount of honey already stored, and 

 the room still left for storage. The result of 

 this lessening of activity during the swarm- 

 ing period may mean a serious loss in the 

 amount of cornb honey produced during a 

 short season. 



The use of an incubator does not do away 

 with the inclination on the part of a hen, 

 after laying a dozen or more eggs, to want 

 to hatch her chicks; but by taking away 

 the eggs and depriving her of the opportu- 

 nity to sit she will continue laying. Why 

 can not a queen be made to start laying 

 and the bees kept in a state of activity in- 

 stead of leaving them to cast a natural 

 swarm? A practical bee-keeper can tell 

 when a colony is making preparations to 

 swarm by various symptoms; and, instead 

 of waiting until the swarm emerges, he can 

 make the projjcr manipulations to forestall 

 such action. 



At the opening of a honey-flow there are 

 always some colonies not strong enough in 

 bees to store in the supers. At the same 

 time, others may be on the verge of swarm- 

 ing, while still others are in the normal con- 

 dition to store honey abundantly. With 'a 

 good strain of bees we need not fear many 

 swarms until the first super is well started, 

 or until about a week or ten days after the 

 main How is on. 



HOW TO FORESTALL SWARMING AND MAKE 

 THE BEES GO TO WORK. 



When placing sujiers on Danzenbaker 

 liives I contract the brood-chamber down 

 to nine frames and a division-board. This 

 makes it more convenient to get at the 

 frames, and at the same time has a tenden- 

 cy to crowd the bees into the supers. As 

 soon as a colony is found making prepara- 

 tions to swarm, all frames with the brood 



and honey, including the super and the 

 bees that are in it, are given to some other 

 colony; the brood is put in an upper story 

 over a weak colony. We now have a 

 "shook" swarm, or one that ]iractically 

 amounts to a natural swarm. In fact, I 

 would treat a natural swarm just as I would 

 this "shook" swarm that I have mention- 

 ed. Place six or eight franies with inch 

 starters in a hive on the old stand; remove 

 the super-cover and put the regular Dan- 

 zenbaker winter cover over the hive-body, 

 giving the bees lots of air as well as shade 

 and i)lenty of room. In from three to five 

 days after this has been done, and the 

 combs are well drawn out and the queen 

 laying freely, remove all but five of the 

 combs and select four combs of the sealed 

 brood from the upper story of the weak col- 

 ony, placing two of these combs on each 

 side of the live new combs left in this new 

 hive on the old stand. Then put on the 

 super — the less honey given, the better. 

 The new combs have started the bees and 

 queen so that all are active. The frames of 

 sealed brood are for the purpose of strength- 

 ening the working force. The queen can 

 then keep depositing eggs as fast as the 

 bees emerge from the cells, and the honey 

 will be stored in the super. 



This plan has given very satisfactory re- 

 sults in this locality, especially with the 

 shallow frames. It is a useless operation, 

 however, if the colony possesses too old a 

 queen, or one that is likely to be supersed- 

 ed. One should be careful not to leave any 

 brood in the hive when making "shook " 

 swarms, as I have not been successful when 

 I have done this. 



After all the weak colonies are built up 

 by adding brood from the "shook " swarms, 

 or when for any reason there are no more 

 weak colonies, I bring a queen with several 

 quarts of bees in a swarm-basket from anotli- 

 er yard and run them on to the brood-combs 

 taken from the said shaken colonies. These 

 combs, however, should be free from bees 

 before releasing the queen and the bees 

 from the basket. 



I find it profitable to leave surplus combs 

 in the upper stories of some of the weak or 

 late colonies, and at the end of the season 

 after the late flow there will be from 30 to 

 50 combs of sealed honey. These may be 

 distributed among the colonies run for comb 

 honey, after the bees are put in winter quar- 

 ters on ten frames. The strong colonies 

 thus produce the comb honey, and the 

 weak colonies help out on winter stores. 



All queens that have i)assed through two 

 honey seasons are destroyed immediately 

 after the close of the basswood flow% or about 

 the first of August, and rijie cells are given 

 the queenless colonies. This gives a major- 

 ity of young queens at the beginning of 

 each season, and none are old enough so 

 that they are likely to be superseded during 

 the height of the main flow. This plan 

 should not be overlooked when running for 

 comb honey. 



Akron, Ohio. 



