1895 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



739 



fine as marble. The pleasant roomy frame 

 house with its wide verandas, which Mr. Root 

 visited, and described a^ being the only frame 

 house that he saw, was entirely an adobe 

 building. 



The numerous readers of Gleanings would 

 be more than pleased to welcome Mr. Root 

 should he ever carry out, his expressed inten- 

 tion of visiting our valley again, and for a long- 

 er time. 



[Our friends s(Mit along a couple of photos, 

 one of which we have roproduct^d in half- tone. 

 In answer to a h'tter asking for the circum- 

 stances connected with the swarm on the hat, 

 McClure Bros, write:] 



THAT SWARM ON THE HAT. 



The picture of the bees on the hat was secur- 

 ed in the following way: A photographer hap- 

 pened to be taking some views of our apiary, 

 when a swarm came«out. The apiarist shook 

 a few of the bees on his hat, and about half of 

 the swarm settled there, and a view was taken. 

 We have an apiary of about 300 hives. The 

 present honey season has been more than usu- 

 ally good, and that is saying a good deal. We 

 ship a carload soon. McClure Bros. 



Las Cruces, N. M., Sept. 11. 



ftUEENS SLOW TO WORK IN AN ADDED 

 STORY. 



By Dr. C. C. Miller. 



Some of my experiences as to queens working 

 in more than one story seem rather contradic- 

 tory. When I have tried to force them to work 

 in a story added above or below, they have 

 seemed very stubbornly against it. I formerly 

 had an impression that a queen in full laying, 

 if changed into a different story or apartment, 

 would be obliged to lay at least for a short 

 time, and that, rather than let the eggs go to 

 waste, she would lay them in any kind of cells 

 to which she had access, providing they were 

 not too deep. 



In some cases I raised the story containing 

 the brood-nest, put the queen into an empty 

 story below, and put an excluder between. I 

 have no exact memoranda of results, but I 

 think there was no case in which she continued 

 laying right along, and I think there was al- 

 ways at least a day or two of sulking. 



Last year I tried to get brood in some half- 

 stories by adding them above or below with an 

 excluder between. They contained both foun- 

 dation and old comb. The result was much 

 less satisfactory than any thing ever tried with 

 stories of full depth. I hardly think the depth 

 of the stories had any thing to do with it, but 

 the season was poorer. Looking at my book, I 

 find I put a half-story over No. 57, May 14, A. 

 M. May 15. p. m., I found no eggs, but found 

 some May 1(3. a. m. I think this was one of the 

 most successful cases. 



At the other extreme was the case of No. 76. 

 May 17 I put the queen above. By some means 

 it was left till June 14, just four weeks later, 

 when I found no brood or eggs in the upper 

 story. Neither was brood to be found, nor eggs, 

 in the lower story. I then put the queen into 

 the lower story, and thouuht all would be well. 

 But eight days later I found no eggs, nor did I 

 find any later; and July 3 I found the old queen 

 on the ground in front of the hive, when I kill- 

 ed her and ended the colony. A case of stub- 

 bornness with a vengeance, wasn't it? 



In the same line of witness is the fact that it 

 is an exceedingly rare thing to find a queen 

 laying in one of my supers, although there is 

 nothing to hinder a queen any more than a 

 worker from going up. In this case, however, 

 it may be that conditions are not to her liking 

 as to thickness of comb, and separators may 

 have something to do with it. 



QUEENS GO READILY FROM ONE STORY TO AN- 

 OTHER. 



On the other hand, I have had many cases in 

 which queens have gone of their own accord 

 into an added story above or below; and I think 

 in every such instance they have continued to 

 go back and forth, keeping up the brood in 

 both stories. Friend "Hatch says his queens 

 will go into a second story; but, once there, 

 they never go down again. When I first read 

 that, I wondered just a little whether there 

 might not be some chance for mistake some- 

 where; but 1 have great confidence in the man. 

 It is possible that his different e.xperience comes 

 from different conditions. I wish he would tell 

 us what kind of top and bottom bars he has, 

 and how much space between them. 



In my case, the top-bars were Ixi-'s', and the 

 bottom- bars %\}>i. with a full inch between 

 them. The space between was filled with 

 comb, so that really it wasn't so very different 

 from a single story with frames of double depth. 



SHALL THE BROOD NEST BE ENLARGED HORI- 

 ZONTALLY OR VERTICALLY ? 



The question as to whether a queen will go 

 back and forth from one story to another be- 

 comes one of importance to those who think as 

 many as ten frames or more are needed during 

 part or the whole of the year. I confess that I 

 am at present inclined to enter the camp of 

 such believers. Having handled extensively 

 both ten-frame and eight-frame hives, the com- 

 pactness of the latter, together with ease and 

 convenience of handling, is such that I am loath 

 to go back to the ten-frame hive. 



If as good results can be obtained, or even if 

 nearly as good results can be obtained by using 

 two stories a part or the whole of the year, 

 avoiding thereby the lifting of the heavier 

 hives, then I want to hold on to the eight- 

 framers. This will hold especially true with 

 such as now have eight-frame hives exclusive- 

 ly, for a change to a larger size would mean a 



