258 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Apk. 1. 



of smoke, nor how carefully I handled them, 

 not giving them the least jar, the same per- 

 formance was gone through with. But I perse- 

 vered, and one day I actually did see her racing 

 over a frame, and promptly beheaded her. Now, 

 this was one of the times when seeing brood 

 and eggs would not satisfy me. 



Sometimes we want to use an excludei' be- 

 tween two stories where the queen has had free 

 access to both, or at the time of putting on su- 

 pers we may want to take away a lower story, 

 in which cases the queen must be seen. 



These may not be all, but I think I have giv- 

 en enough instances to show that there are 

 times when the sight of brood and eggs is not 

 sufficient. In the instances that I have given, 

 proof of the presence of a queen is not suificient 

 — the queen herself must be seen. 



Marengo, 111., Jan. 25. 



[Yes, I grant there are times when we must 

 see the queen herself ; but in the great majori- 

 ty of cases the seeing of a frame of her eggs 

 and brood is all that you and the rest of us 

 really reouire.— Ed.] 



INFALLIBLE METHODS OF INTRODUCING 

 QUEENS. 



HOFFMAN frames; THE PROPER WAY OF 

 NAILING THEM. 



By C. Davenport. 



That "infallible" method of introducing 

 queens, described on page 13, would, I think, 

 prove a pretty safe way; but I have some 

 doubts whether it would work in all cases with 

 colonies that contained laying workers. Of 

 late, when I have such colonies, instead of in- 

 troducing a queen to them I introduce them to 

 a queen by uniting them with another colony 

 or colonies that have a queen. 



A method which has so far proved infallible 

 with me, and which I usually follow when I 

 have a valuable queen to introduce, is to select 

 some colony to receive her that is in pretty 

 good condition, and has a laying queen, and 

 then remove all the brood as well as the queen; 

 but I leave or give them a number of combs 

 containing some honey. I then introduce the 

 queen by the usual candy plan; and after she 

 has commenced to lay I return some or all the 

 combs that were removed, which at the time 

 of removal I give to some colony that is able to 

 care for them a short time. I always remove 

 all bees from the cage except the queen; for. 

 like Mr. Doolittle, I think when strong bees are 

 left in the cage, especially if they have come 

 from a distance, they are sometimes the cause 

 of the queen's being killed. But I practice the 

 plan just described only when I wish to use 

 more than ordinary care in introducing. 



Last season, although I bought and introduc- 

 ed quite a number of queens, I lost only one, 

 and she was introduced all right. I got two 

 from you last spring; and while they were in- 



troduced all right, the yellow, or five-banded 

 one, after she had been laying for a week or 

 ten days, suddenly disappeared. There were 

 no queen-cells nor any being started at the 

 time. The other one from you, which was a 

 three-banded tested Italian, proved to be a very 

 good one. She is proliflc, and her bees are great 

 workers. With two exceptions they outstripped 

 every thing I had last summer; but they are 

 not as gentle as some others I have, though 

 they are not bad bees to handle. But for me, I 

 do not want bees too gentle. 



There is one disadvantage or fault in the 

 Hoffman self-spacing frame that I do not re- 

 member of seeing mentioned. This is, however, 

 quite a serious one, though I do not know that 

 it could really be called the fault of the frame 

 itself. This consists in the way in which they 

 are nailed together. There are two ways these 

 frames can be nailed, and either way is right; 

 or that is, they will work either way equally 

 well, if one never gets any that are nailed the 

 other way. All the Hoffman frames I have 

 were purchased in the flat, and I think I have 

 nailed them together wrongly; for when that 

 extractor I ordered of you last summer came, 

 there was a Hoffman frame all nailed together, 

 standing in one of the baskets, and this frame 

 was nailed together the opposite way from 

 what mine are. What I mean is this: Suppose 

 we take a hive and place it so it will face the 

 south. Now, if we take that frame that you 

 sent, and hang it in this hive, the V'd edge on 

 the south end of the frame will be on the east 

 side of the hive, and the V'd edge on the 

 north end of the frame will be on the west side 

 of the hive, and this, of course, will be the 

 same if the frame is changed end for end. 

 Now, if one of my frames were hung in that 

 hive, the V'd edge at the south would be on the 

 west side, and the V'd edge at the north on the 

 east side just the opposite from yours, though 

 mine will, of course, work just as well as yours; 

 but if I were to buy 25 colonies of you, or you 

 bought that number of me, if it were ever de- 

 sired to exchange these frames, or mix them up 

 with others in the apiary, and one should wish 

 to do this sooner or later, they would not work 

 together; for when two of these frames that are 

 nailed opposite ways are placed side by side, the 

 two Vd edges would be together and the two 

 square edges together. While the two square 

 edges being together would not make so much 

 difference, the two V'd edges would, if they 

 were crowded much, slip or crowd past each 

 other some, and thus space too close, of course. 

 These frames are illustrated, and we are told 

 how to nail them together, in the catalogs; but 

 many who have never used or seen any of these 

 frames nailed up would not think any thing 

 about starting to nail them a certain way as 

 long as they kept the V'd edges on the diagonal- 

 ly opposite sides, and nailed them all the same 

 way they started. It is all in the way one 



