384 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



May 15. 



1000 or 1100 colonies. Thirteen hundred vyere 

 put in last fall; but the cellar was overstocked, 

 and some had to be taken out the last of March 

 to relieve it. The last have just been taken 

 out, and we find them in fair condition. They 

 wintered quite well up to March, when they 

 began to waste rapidly, owing to warm weather 

 outside. There were no dead ones in the first 

 three hundred set out, and only nineteen in all. 

 Half of this loss was from causes unknown; the 

 other half was caused by poor queens 

 and lack of stores, occasioned by 

 somebody's blunder in looking over, 

 weighing, or feeding. The poorest 

 wintering was a lot of hanging-comb 

 hives set in for transferring. The 

 bees from two of our out'apiaries did 

 not winter quite as well as the I'e- 

 mainder. The out-yard bees do not 

 winter as well as our home yard. This 

 is attributed to the disturbance of 

 moving them home, and to a certain 

 amount of mixing up and loss of bees 

 that seems unavoidable. Our best 

 bees came from those parts of the cel- 

 lar having the freest ventilation. .; / 



I do not care to discuss the subject ',»''< 

 of ventilation, as I have already done '-' 

 so (page 322 of the American Bee 

 Journal, 1SH8) ; but after our experi- 

 ence it is somewhat exasperating to 

 be told that bees need no ventilation ;= 



while in winter quarters. This state- % 



ment, in entire disregard of well-es- 

 tablished scientific principles, and of 

 all practical experience bearing on 

 the subject, is on a par with the as- 

 sertion that bees can make honey 

 from commercial sugar. P. H. Elwood 



Stark ville, N. Y., April 22. 



bottom, as shown. This same square hole, if 

 we ai'e correct, is considered very important by 

 Mr. Elwood, in wintering his bees, the same af- 

 fording ample bottom ventilation, and allowing 

 dead bees to drop out bf the way to a greater or 

 less extent. We notice that Mr. Elwood also 

 considers the closed-end frames have special 

 advantages for cellar wintering. That there 

 are such advantages, can hardly be questioned. 

 The closed ends themselves form one wall, and 



.,,:m^ 



[When we visited Mr. Elwbod, two years ago, 

 we took more than an ordinary interest in that 

 mammoth bee-cellar, especially when we learn- 

 ed that he could winter over a thousand colo- 

 nies in it successfully; and it was one of the 

 first requests we made, that he describe in 

 Gleanings this cellar, together with his meth- 

 od of wintering so many colonies. He kindly 

 consented to do so; but a pressure of other du- 

 ties seems to have delayed it until now. While 

 we were talking we mentioned that it must be 

 quite a sight to see so many colonies together, 

 preparatory to putting into the cellar, all in one 

 bunch, after hauling home from the out-yards. 

 One of the yard men answered that it was in- 

 deed a sight, and we thereupon asked Mr. El- 

 wood to prepare a photograph at our expense, 

 when the colonies were again assembled in the 

 fall; but it seems that, although the bees were 

 in a valley, it was quite impossible to get a sat- 

 isfactory view showing the whole number; so 

 you will have to be content to supplement in 

 imagination what you see in the picture, the 

 remainder of the colonies. 



The hives shown in the foreground are the 

 same as all the rest. The standard orood-nest 

 is made up of eight closed-end frames— the 

 frames of Quinby depth, but shortened some 

 two or three inches, we believe. An outside 

 square box of K lumber, without bottom, tele- 

 scopes over the frames. When a super is put 

 on, this telescoping shell is raised up enough to 

 accommodate it. 



Along in this connection it may be interesting 

 to reproduce an engraving which was shown 

 some time ago in our columns. This shows the 

 modified Quinby hive as used by Elwood and 

 Hetherington. It Is intended to show how the 

 frames are separated for the purpose of enabl- 

 ng one to find the queen, etc. The entrance to 



he hive is through a square hole through the 



QUINBY CLOSED-END FRAMES MANIPULATED. 



the telescopic cover or body forms another. 



The barn, honey-house, and bee-cellar, is, as 

 nearly as we can remember, exactly as shown in 

 the diagram. At the time we were there we 

 considered it a model in the matter of conven- 

 ience for the special purpose for which it was 

 designed. And that bee-cellar— oh my ! When 

 we considered the varying success of bee-keep- 

 ers who have only a hundred colonies in one 

 cellar, Mr. Elwood's wintering seemed to us sim- 

 ply marvelous, and we regard it so yet. 



We take it that Mr. Elwood, under. some cir- 

 cumstances, would use artificial heat — that is, 

 providing the number of colonies in the cellar 

 were small enough so as not to give the requi- 

 site temperature to produce a change of air; 

 and, so far. he would agree with Ur. Miller. 



There was a time when even we ourselves 

 were led to believe that bees needed very little 

 ventilation in bee-cellars; but reports of late 

 have shown quite conclusively that it is a most 

 serious mistake.] 



SEX OF EGGS FROM ftUEEN-BEES. 



HOW AND WHEN IT IS DETERMINED; SOME OE- 

 THODOX TEACHING FROM DR. MILLER. 



Dr. C. C. Mifler;— Relative to a topic that you 

 touch upon in the last number of Gleanings, I 

 should like to ask a couple of questions that 

 you can either reply to directly or through 

 Gleanings. I wish to allude to the determina- 

 tion of sex in bees. Suppose you take some 

 eggs, just laid, from worker-cells, and trans- 

 plant them into drone-cells; and, conversely, 

 take some eggs from some drone-cells and place 

 them in vacant worker-cells; what will be the 

 effect of this transposition upon the hatching 

 product? Will the eggs transferred in the first 

 case produce worker bees of increased size, and, 

 in the second case, drones of diminished size? 

 I had always supposed that the germs, or eggs. 



