1910 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



6;u 



THAT NEW BEE DISEASE. 



Is Not the Trouble Caused by the Bees being 



Confined too Closely After Working Heavily 



on Some Particular Blossom? 



BY JAMES M. PULLEY. 



The correspondence by Catherine Beattie, 

 June 15, and the more recent one of E. F. 

 Robinson, p. 516, Aug. 15, are interesting to 

 me because of a similar occurrence recently 

 in my own yard, and in a greater or less de- 

 gree in several other small apiaries in this 

 locality. 



Personally I can not attribute the trouble 

 to any particular disease, but I think it is 

 owing to bees being more or less confined 

 when they are full of nectar from some par- 

 ticular source. In the case of the bees in 

 my own and neighboring yards this year it 

 was while they were working on blackberry 

 bloom that the trouble occurred, and the 

 weather was decidedly wet: yet the blooms 

 were so attractive that the bees worked 

 them every possible minute from early 

 morning until dark; and with the approach 

 of rain there was a hurried flight for the 

 hives. 



This, in my opinion, gave the bees no 

 chance for inverting the nectar, which 

 seemed to have in its uninverted condition 

 the tendency to bloat, such as your previous 

 correspondents referred to. Many bees 

 could be found lying around, apparently in 

 the same condition that the yellow-jackets 

 are in the fall when they find quantities of 

 ripe fruit on which they " glut " themselves, 

 and which seems to ferment and prevent 

 their rising on the wing; and when they get 

 into a very advanced condition from the ef- 

 fects of the apparent fermentation there is a 

 case of what looks like paralysis, with only 

 a poor attempt at flying, or even only a vi- 

 bration of the wings. I have on many oc- 

 casions killed scores by treading on them 

 (the yellow-jackets) , and it appears to me 

 this bee trouble is identical, and to which I 

 would pay no attention were it not for the 

 fact that a hive of bees can be decimated 

 fifty to eighty per cent (estimated) in a 

 week or ten days, and it is the most notice- 

 able in a newly hived swarm where there is 

 no brood hatching to take the place of the 

 failing bees, while at the same time the 

 queen will be shrunken to the size of a vir- 

 gin; and the apiarist who does not recog- 

 nize it will expect to see signs of superse- 

 dure, which does not take place; but it will 

 so badly decimate the colonies affected that 

 the chances of a surplus for the season are 

 almost hopeless. The harder the bees work, 

 the worse the case; consequently the best 

 bees are the worst affected. Left alone, the 

 bees slowly recover, and the queen resumes 

 her normal condition; but it is a severe blow 

 to the whole apiary. 



I do not know if feeding good sugar syrup 

 at such times would effect a cure or modify 

 the trouble. I throw it out as a suggestion 

 in the hope that some may try it, and that 



our best queens may not be condemned for 

 producing a disease when I really believe 

 they are producing the more energetic work- 

 ers which get poisoned by the rankness of 

 the nectar gathere-^ because they can not 

 take the necessary exercise immediately 

 upon gathering it, so that it can be inverted 

 without delay. 



I submit this to your readers, as it ap- 

 pears to have come under my observation 

 on several occasions — not so much at one 

 particular season of the year, but at several, 

 and would apply at any reasonably moist 

 time when bees would have time to gather 

 a load of nectar and hurry home without a 

 chance to invert it projierly. 



Melrose, Mass., Sept. 2. 



YOUNG BEES NEEDED TO INSURE SAFE 

 QUEEN INTRODUCTION. 



BY WM. M. WHITNEY. 



On page 564 Mr. E. L. Dickinson gives an 

 interesting account of failure in attempting 

 to introduce a queen to one of his colonies, 

 and asks the editor or some reader to ex- 

 plain why this particular colony should be 

 so stubborn in the way of accepting a queen. 

 Now, I'd like to give fay idea as to the cause 

 of the trouble. I gather from his account 

 that this colony is made up, or nearly so, of 

 old bees. He says they were filling their 

 comb full of honey, and not a cell having 

 an egg. There were no nurse-bees, or but 

 few, to prepare food for larvcP. Why should 

 there be? There were no larvae to feed. 

 Evidently there was a fair honey-flow on, 

 and the whole force was busy storing sup- 

 plies. This colony might have developed 

 laying workers, but that would depend up- 

 on the season of the year. If late in the 

 season it would not be likely to. But what 

 is the remedy in such a case ? Before at- 

 tempting to introduce a queen, which 

 should be a laying one, smoke the bees suf- 

 ficiently to cause them to fill themselves 

 with honey, which should be done toward 

 night, when they are likely to be all at 

 home; then move the hive to one side and 

 ]ilace on its stand another with a couple of 

 frames of brood in all stages of growth, tak- 

 en from some hive that can spare it, being 

 sure that there are plenty of hatching bees. 

 Over these, in the center of the hive, place 

 the caged queen as jier instructions; then 

 shake all the bees in the parent colony on 

 to a cloth at a distance from the stand and 

 let them return at their leisure, filling uj) 

 the hive on the parent stand with the frames 

 after the bees are shaken. I venture the 

 opinion that there will be no killing of the 

 queen when she is released from the cage if 

 this method is adopted. 



Mr. Editor, your mistake in the case you 

 cite, I opine, was in giving to the colony a 

 frame of " freshly laid eggs" instead of a 

 good supply of hatching brood to furnish 

 nurse bees. 



Batavia, 111., Sept. 8. 



