406 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



July, 1918 



FROM THE FIELD OF EXPERIENCE 



instinct or sense of general direction and 

 not by color or any little distinguishing 

 marks. 



The queens would invariably come back, 

 go up to the entrance of their own hive or 

 of the one nearest to it, and go in one or 

 the other, regardless of the color. Fre- 

 quently they would go behind the hive and 

 try to get into the screened ventilator. I 

 found my nuclei were too close together 

 and the loss was over 25 per cent. In an- 

 other part of the yard I painted them all 

 one color, and the loss was no more than 

 with the ones with different colors. 



That queens are led by a general sense of 

 direction, rather than to any fine detail, I 

 have noticed many times. For instance, if 

 a queen has a flight from two different lo- 

 calities a number of feet apart, when she 

 comes back from the second she will return 

 to neither, but usually go halfway between 

 the two. 



I have had virgin queens that had had a 

 flight escape from my hand when I was 

 taking them to another hive. They would 

 fly away with the usual circling, but would 

 return somewhere between the place from 

 which they escaped and their old home. 



The accompanying photo will illustrate a 

 case that occurred last September. I had a 

 batch of queen-cells built in hive No. 2. I 

 intended to make a photograph of these and 

 therefore took extra pains in grafting them 

 so all would be accepted. I think all but 

 one in the 40 were accepted and were being 

 drawn out into long beautiful cells. 



When the day came for them to be sealed, 

 I looked at them and was astonished to find 

 every cell not sealed but every larva re- 

 moved and all royal jelly cleaned out. I 

 knew that meant they had a queen, and I 

 was dumbfounded to know where she came 

 from as the hive was made queenless and 

 broodless only a few days before. I soon 

 found the queen and recognized her as one 

 from hive No. 1. On recalling an incident 

 of a few days preceding, I soon saw how 

 the queen from hive 1 happened to be in 

 hive 2. This is how it occurred. 



Hive No. 1 contained my breeder, and the 

 bees were superseding hen After the vir- 

 gin was several days old, I thought I would 

 remove her and let them raise another. So 

 I took her to a queenless colony, No. 3. In 

 trying to introduce her, she escaped and 

 flew away. After I had stood there some 

 time, she came back and I caught her. I 

 believe this was her first flight. I thought 

 I had better not try to introduce her and 

 therefore took her back to her old hive, No. 

 1. Now she had had a flight from No. 3, but 

 not from No. 1. Next day she took her 

 wedding flight and was mated. In return- 

 ing her instinct took her halfway between 

 No. 1 and No. 3, so she entered hive No. 2. 

 This happened to be my cell-building colony. 



and, being queenless, the bees accepted her 

 much to the detriment of my cells. In a day 

 or two she began to lay, so I left her there 

 in her adopted home. Jay Smith. 



Vincennes, Ind. 



[Mel Pritchard, our queen-breeder and a 

 very close observer, says that he has always 

 supposed that queens mark their location 

 each time they take a flight; but he says he 

 may be wrong, as he has had no experience 

 with queens that have taken flights from two 

 or more locations. Mr. Pritchard also says 

 he had supposed that queens took note of 

 color, but that he has no proof of this.— Edi- 

 tor.] 



a ■ — ic ^ ctcrr: na 



SHALLOW VS. DEEP SUPERS 



This Man Doesn't Agree with J. E. Crane and 

 Other Deep Super Advocates 



There has been some discussion as to the 

 advantages of the shallow frame in produc- 

 ing extracted honey. Keep it up until we 

 have a better argument than that we just 

 happened to have this or that equipment. I 

 consider the above subject a very important 

 one just now because many are changing 

 over from comb to extracted honey on ac- 

 count of the high price of the latter. Then 

 there is the beginners' class, which will be 

 large, as beekeeping, without a doubt, will 

 take a big jump in the next few years. 



The beginner will be reading everything 

 lie can get hold of, from the best textbook 

 down to the Government bulletin^ after 

 which he will be none the wiser so far as a 

 definiti^ decision is concerned. If a person 

 wishes to start in a new business and seeks 

 a little information from those of experi- 

 ence, he will be advised above all else to 

 begin right, because he will be hampered all 

 thru by making a wrong start. But when 

 such men as J. E. Crane say that the shallow 

 frame is a first-class nuisance, it certainly 

 is a stunner, and I think some have not got 

 over it yet. Others will say that it can 

 never be decided which is better — the shal- 

 low or Langstroth size, on account of that 

 big word ' ' locality. ' ' But that is just where 

 the shallow frame comes in. It can be 

 adapted to a strong flow or a light flow of 

 honey — to a large colony or a small one. 



In my early beekeeping experience I used 

 the Langstroth frame exclusively, mainly be- 

 cause the large producers used it; but things 

 have changed greatly. 



The auto truck is one of the greatest 

 agencies for improvement that has come up 

 for a long time, especially for beekeeping. 

 This truck affords rapid transportation facil- 

 ities in hauling honey to a central extracting 

 station, an advantage which is practically 

 impossible with the Langstroth size of 

 frame, since the deep Langstroth frames 

 flop back and forth, bruising and breaking 



