588 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Aug. 1. 



been received by the association, from England. 

 This was highly appreciated by ttie members, 

 and was the means of getting a large number 

 present to become deeply interested in bee- 

 keeping. After the general business was dis- 

 posed of, which followed the president's ad- 

 dress, Mr. John Shallcross, of Philadelphia, 

 read a very interesting paper on the relation of 

 bees to fertilization of plants and flowers. This 

 was followed by an address by Mrs. Thomas, of 

 New York, who has been trying to get author- 

 ities to establish an apiary in Central Park, 

 New York. She is now in Cincinnati, O., try- 

 ing to interest authorities there in establishing 

 a public apiary in their park. 



F. Halman, Jr., Sec. 

 Wyncote, Pa., June 13. 



[Mr. Selser is one of the queen -breeders who 

 has lately come strongly into prominence. He 

 is an enthusiast on the subject of bees, and has 

 done much to enhance the interest of the pur- 

 suit in and about Philadelphia. It is with 

 pleasure that we show you one of his yards. 

 Wyncote is simply a suburb of Philadelphia. — 

 Ed.J 



CAGING A aUEEN AT SWARMING. 



POST- CON STKUCTED QUKKNCEI.I>S: SECTIONS 

 AND TIERING UP: QUKSTIONS OF A BE- 

 GINNER ANSWERED. 



By Dr. C. C. Miller. 



A correspondent writes: 



I have six colonies of bees, in which I take great 

 delight; but on account of poor health I desire no 

 increase. So when the bees swarra I have practiced 

 the plan given on page 69 of " A Year among the 

 Bees." Cage the queen ; in five days, cut out queen- 

 cells, and, five days later, cut out cells again and 

 liberate the queen. Last year the plan worlied like 

 a charm. This year it failed in one case. The 

 swarm issued May 3, and I caged the queen and put 

 her where the bees could care for her. May 8 I cut 

 out queen-cells, and May 13 I cut out queen-cells 

 and liberated the queen. May 30, or 17 days from 

 the time I liberated the queen, the swarm came out 

 again. Knowing the queen was clipped I was in no 

 hurry to cage her; but in a moment I saw the queen 

 rise, and fly among the bees in the air. Then I 

 knew it was not my old queen but a young one. 

 On examination I could find not a sign of a queen- 

 cell left in the hive; and how could they make a 

 queen-cell with no eggs or young larva? ? and why 

 should this last queen leave the hive with no sign 

 of a queen-cell in the hive ? It was impossible for 

 this young queen to be fertilized, as she could not 

 have been old enough. If I kept her in the cage she 

 never could be fertilized. Please explain the case 

 and say what you would do. J. S. F. 



I don't know for certain; but I can at least 

 give a guess as to one way. You cut out queen- 

 cells May 8, and the bejs immediately started 

 a lot more. May 13 you cut them out again, 

 but this time one escaped your notice, for these 

 post-constructed cells are sometimes exceeding- 

 ly difficult to detect; and somewhere about 

 May 20 a young queen hatched out. May 30 



she flew out to meet tlie drones, and the bees 

 flew out with her. Possibly if you had left the 

 swarm aloue it might have returned to the hive; 

 and yet, bees are freaky things, and you nev- 

 er know for certain what they may do. In 

 any case, 1 don't think I would cage such a 

 queen, but just return the swarra lo the hive, 

 and I don't think you would need to return it 

 many times before the bees would settle down 

 to business and give up their foolishness. 



SOME QUESTIONS AS TO AVORKING FOR COMB 

 HONEY. 



I believe you make a specialty of comb honey. 

 This I have been doing on a small scale, and desire 

 a little information to oftset my inexperience. I 

 should be obliged if you would answer my questions 

 in Gleanings. 



.1. What style of seclion do you think the bees 

 work most easily in ? I am using the " three open- 

 ing;" but this debars me from tiering up, and I 

 thought it might l)e advisable to change. 



3. Do you advocate "tiering" ? 



3. Do you use tlie eight or tlie tun frame hive for 

 section honey ? Mine are ten-frauie. as I thought 

 that I could contract a len-frame but could not cx- 

 jmnd an eight-frame hive. W. 



1. I don't believe the' bees care such a won- 

 derful sight what kind of sections you give 

 them; but I suspect that, if they expressed a 

 preference, it would be for that which comes 

 the nearest to a regular brood -frame. The 

 reasons in general for using one kind of section 

 in preference to another are because we want 

 what will suit the convenience of the bee- 

 keeper, and especially what will suit the de- 

 mands of the market. For these reasons the 

 43^x4)^ section is very popular. As to the 

 width of the section there is not so much agree- 

 ment. The tendency seems toward a narrower 

 section than that which was at tirst used. I 

 think nearly every one used them l\^ at tirst; 

 but at present there are in use sections IX wide, 

 1%. IH, and I think there are some who use !}{. 

 Before answering this question further I will 

 anticipate the answer to your second question 

 by saying that I would not have a section that 

 would not allow tiering up, so I would not have 

 a section without open top. Mine are open top 

 and bottom. I have tried them with open sides, 

 but could discover no particular advantage, 

 with the disadvantage that they are not quite 

 so safe from marring in handling. 



2. I practice tiering. 1 think we can not well 

 get along without some way by which we can 

 give the bees additional room without waiting 

 for them to finish entirely what sections are 

 on. If sections have closed tops, and are placed 

 on top, there can be put on, at one time, only a 

 single tier. With a hive no larger than ten 

 frames this will allow only 28 to 32 sections, ani a 

 strong colony will easily work on more. Then 

 when they are nearly finished there will be a 

 loss of time when the bees might just as well 

 be filling up some fresh sections. With a strong 



