"NOVICES'" GiLEAmSatf IN BEE CULTURE. 



00 



may yet succeed and turn thepasi experi- 

 ence to a good acdounl at last. In con- 

 clusion I would say to every beginner, 

 post a j>, and thoroughly, too; get one or 

 more of the best text books published, al- 

 so one. or more of the best bee journals. 

 Remember that knowledge is power, and 

 with this and proper care you will succeed. 

 Axxie Larch, Ashland, Mo. 

 As to why bees at times refuse to rear 

 queens from brood, it is hard to decide, 

 hi some of our earlier experiments this 

 was often the ease, yet for some reason 

 o\- other we have no such failures now. 

 We have known a queen with bad wings 

 to prevent cells being started time and 

 again, and thus threaten the ruin of the 

 colony until she was hunted out and 

 killed. Miss Annie's example of perse 

 Terence is quite commendable, and well 

 may she add "knowledge is power ' in bee- 

 keeping. By the way, we imagine her 

 sex is as fond of power — i. c, the power 

 to command success — as the "lords of 

 v roation, even. 



A OOOD WAY TO 1IIVK A SWARM. 



C'JjLIP the queen's wings: attach a 

 1) Quinby queen-yard to the hive, and 

 when they swarm the queen will usu- 

 ally be found moving about on the bottom 

 of the queen-yard. Sometimes she will 

 be surrounded by a cluster ot bees. Cage 

 ihe queen and place her at the entrance 

 of the new hive, which must be placed as 

 near (lie other as convenient. When the 

 -warm is all out, lay a cloth over the 

 queen yard to prevent the bees from re- 

 turning to the ol 1 hive, which you can 

 place where you wish to have it remain, 

 and liberate the queen. .1. Pratt, 



Mallet Creek, Medina. Co., 0. 

 Quinby' s queen-yards for an apiary of 

 fifty hives or more would be quite an ex- 

 pense, and still more of a bother, it seems 

 to us. If the ground is .kept clean around 

 the hive, as We have directed, the queen 

 can be found generally with little trouble, 

 without a queen-yard or anything of the 

 kind. 



Hives, Extractors, etc., etc., can. of 

 course be sent cheaper as freight, but, 

 many do not seem to recognize that it 

 is quite uncertain as far as time ol tran- 

 sit is concerned. For instance, we shou ' 

 expect to get a bee hive from New York 

 by express in at least three days, but it' 

 we ordered b< sent as freight it might 

 .come in a week, but it' it should take three 

 tweeks we should think it nothing very 

 strange. Either way is safe, although we 

 must expect that goods by the latter way 

 may be exposed to rough handling and 

 rough weather too. perhaps, and so the.\ 

 shouldbe more carefully packed. 



Where there is no immediate need of 

 the articles, and they exceed 20 or 25 lbs. 

 in weight, we should advise vii freight 



SHALL WE KXTRAi'T FROM THE 

 KROOI) COMBS ? 



fjJHAT Mrs. Tupper, and in fact the 

 . i entire National Contention fell into 



a grievous error in supposing the extract 

 or injured the brood, admits of no ques- 

 tion, but Mrs. T's further suggestion that 

 nothing be gained by extracting combs 

 containing brood is a point that might be 

 considered. A case to the point has jus! 

 occurred during the late dry weather. 



< Fur index scales have shown a daily in- 

 crease of two or two and a half lbs. per 

 day, and Novice argued that spreading 

 the combs by placing an empty one be- 

 tween them would secure all the honey 

 until they were storing in the upper stor- 

 ies. 



Recollect we were so fortunate as to 

 have plenty ol extra combs which is not 

 always the case, but "P. (i." strongly in- 

 sisted that the better way was to go "right 

 through" and extract them all in regular 

 order or at least to commence in that way 

 and stop whenever it seemed advisable. 

 The result was that we obtained nearly 

 two barrels as lias been stated elsewhere 

 and the brood combs were found so filled 

 with honey that it was utterly impossible 

 for the queen to deposit eggs with any 

 kind of convenience, tor even the empty 

 cuu' s placed in the middle were gener 

 ally tilled with honey and pollen. 



The honey was found principally in 

 bulged br lengthened cells around near the 

 brood, and had evidently been stored and 

 capped in a manner that was certainly 

 poorer economy of both wax and labor 

 than would have been the case bad it been 

 stored over the surface of whole combs. 

 That the latter result can be secured, was 

 shown by two hives that had been extract- 

 ed about a week previously, and further 

 still the index scales showed a gain of 

 three and three-fourth lbs. instead of two 

 the dav after they had been extracted. 

 Was not "P. G." right? 



Again our friend G. W. Dean of River 

 Styx this county, contends that a single 

 story Gallup hive of eighteen frames will 

 give as much surplus honey as two or 

 more stories, and were it not for the fact 

 that Mr. D. gets about as much honey per 

 hive as any of us, we might feel surer that 

 he had gone to another extreme. In 1870 

 he took 900 lbs. from the six hives that 

 comprised his apiary, besides making sev- 

 eral artificial swarms. He obliges his 

 bees to build all worker combs by remov- 

 ing their brood to weaker hives when they 

 try to build drone comb, and altogether 

 be gets a fine lot of honey with but few, 

 simple appliances and little labor: and 

 now we have just got to the point, for he 

 gets all his honey stored around the brood 

 and makes it a point to have brood in 

 ( r, ,■>/ frame during the honey harvest. 



Mrs. Tupper speaks of natural swarm- 

 ing at times when the bees were not stor- 

 ing honey or as she expresses it "when 

 there is literally no honey to be expect-. 



