1890 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



769 



■when the hivos were tluis lillcd and the flow of 

 honey occurred, excessive swarming was sure to 

 result, which gave a loss in honey and often in 

 queens, owing to the fact that tlie queens were 

 not allowed to go with th(> swarms. Swarming, 

 when working for section lioney, can not very 

 well be avoided, or at least 1 have not been suc- 

 cessful in avoiding it without sacrificing a 

 large amount of the honey crop. In fact I 

 would as soon have crcfss/cc swarming as to try 

 to hinder swarming altogether: for in this 

 hindering process, by any of the plans with 

 which I am acquainted, where the ordinary 

 hive is used, the bees are so thrown out of their 

 normal condition that they will not work to the 

 best advantage. Again, I think that a mistak- 

 en idea prevails with some in tliinking that the 

 brood-chamber to the hives must be kept full of 

 brood the whole season through. This is not 

 the secret of a successful honey production, but 

 it lies in having the brood-chamber filled with 

 brood before it is filled with honey. Thus doing, 

 we get the laborers for the first harvest, and, so 

 far as my knowledge extends, when the brood- 

 chamber is thus filled at the time the honey- 

 flow commences, there will be bees enough 

 reared for all practical purposes after this, even 

 though the combs may be filled later on. two- 

 thirds full of honey. There are two plans or ways 

 of management which can be used successful- 

 ly during the swarming season, in this locality; 

 and if I lived in Colorado I would try them 

 there, and then, if they did not work. I would 

 study something else. Right here I wish to say 

 that no one should follow any of our writers 

 blindly, that is. witliout having some thoughts 

 of their own, thoughts which will lead them out 

 in all directions from the beaten path of a 

 Langstroth, a Quinby, a Root, a Dadant. a 

 Doolittle, or any other writei'. Don't be a 

 machine, but be the iiKtster of a machine, or of 

 any thing else you mayjtake hold of. So when 

 you find yourself confronted with the swarming 

 problem, or any other, master it, if it " takes all 

 summer." and do It by your ow)i planning, or 

 the modifying of some plan that yon have read 

 or heard al;out. In this way you will grow: and 

 by telling us liow you did it. in some of the many 

 journalsof ourday. you will help some one else to 

 grow: and thus we shall be of mutual benefit one 

 to the other, justas the all-wise Father design- 

 ed we should be. "No man liveth to himself, and 

 no man dieth to himself." Hut, to return: 

 When a swarm issues, and whil(> it is out in the 

 air or clustered, go to the hive from which it came 

 and take out all the frames of brood and put in 

 their places frames of empty comb, frames filled 

 with foundation, or frames having starters on 

 them, as is best pleasing to you, returning the 

 surplus arrangement on the hive as it was be- 

 fore; and if the swai-m is a large one, it is well 

 to give additional room by way of surplus sec- 

 tions. Now hive the swarm back in the same 

 hive, or let it return if the queen has her wing 

 clipped. Set the frames of brood with the 

 adhering bees in a hive on a new stand, and in 

 24 hours give a mature queen-cell or a queen, 

 according to what you can supply. This 

 should satisfy any colony; but if the swarm on 

 the old stand persisted in swarming out in a day 

 or two, or in a " week's time," as the writer says 

 theirs often do, then I would cage the queen for 

 from a few days to two weeks, according to cir- 

 cumstances, after which I would I'elease her. 

 This is on the plan of doubling our colonies 

 each year. If I wished no increase, th(m I 

 would put on a queen-excluder after putting 

 in the frames below, or after putting these frames 

 in the brood-chamber where the/rames of brood 

 were taken from, and on top of this I would 

 place the hive containing tln^se frames of 

 brood, while top of this last I would put 



the surplus arrangement that was on the 

 hive when the swurm issued. This should do 

 away witli all further swarming. l)ut it results 

 in filling these coml)s wiiicii now have the brood 

 in them, witfi honey, which must be extracted, 

 while it lessens our crop of section honey just 

 that much. Now, if. instead of putting this hive 

 of brood immediately on top of the queen-ex- 

 cluding-honey board, we place the sections 

 there and then place the hive of brood on top of 

 the sections, we shall get our honey mostly in 

 sections, but we shall not be as sure of stopping all 

 further swarming, for, as the bees hatch out from 

 the brood above, they will crowd below, thus 

 making the colony appear more populous than 

 it did in the other case. If the sections were 

 open-top sections, then it would not appear 

 more crowded, for the bees would be equally 

 distributed throughout the whole hive, but in 

 this case we should have our section honey bad- 

 ly travel-stained, which is about the same as 

 having it in the brood-combs, as we did where 

 the sections were top. To obviate this I allow 

 the bees a passageway only at the outside of 

 each of the outside sections, which is done by 

 a slot in the outside boards or sides of the case or 

 section-holder. In this way the colony is kept 

 together and good results secured, and should 

 work in Colorado, it seems to me. 

 Borodino. N. Y. G. M. Doolittle. 



UNCAPPING-BOX. 



A MOST EXCELLENT DEVICE. 



On pag(> 30, Vol. IT.^Mr. Root promised the 

 readers of Uleanings a description of my un- 

 cappiiig-hox: but as he has not fulfilled his 

 promise yet, I will try to help him out. It was 

 made by R. Wilkin aliout 12 years ago, and was 

 so well planned that I should not care to have 

 it changed in any way now. It is 2 feet wide, 

 2 deep, and 6 long outside, made of K lumber 

 dressed on both sides. The bottom is 2 inches 

 lower in the middle than at the sides, and is lined 

 with tin to keep it from leaking. Eleven pieces of 

 wood. 1x1x22 inches, are laid across the bottom 

 about () inches apart to support the screen which 

 the cappings fall on. This leaves room below 

 the screen for the honey tq run to one end, 



M INTYRE S UNCAPPING -BOX. 



where it passes out through a tin pipe. Two 

 pieces, Xx3x72 inches, are nailed on the top 

 edge, one on each side, to contract the top of the 

 box to the same width that a Langstroth hive 

 is long inside. Two pieces, %xXxl8?^, nailed 

 one on each end between the two last mention- 

 ed, bring the ends up ev(>n with the sides. One 

 piece, %x3xKS'*„. is fixed across the top of the 

 box about 14 inches from one end, with an iron 

 pivot sticking up through it, IH inches high to 

 rest the combs on. When uncapping you set 

 one end of the comb on this pivot, uncap one 

 side, whirl it around, and uncap the other side, 

 and set the comb in the end of tiie box, as in the 

 diagram. When we have a surplus of combs 

 we often hang them in the other (Mid like B, in 

 the diagram. C is cappings, and D the space 

 for the honey to run out. 



