f.874. 



CLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



125 



[Continued from pagcViS.] 

 the other although made fully six weeks later, 

 and nothing prevented the execution of our 

 original intention, viz., killing the "crooked 

 Queen," except that she proved pwre, and the 

 other hybrid. After some discussion they were 

 both to be allowed to winter and further steps 

 decided upon in the spring. The Queen found 

 ut the entrance was not crooked and the exam- 

 ination to-day showed that our division board 

 although nicely fitted at the time, had shrunk 

 >o much that the bees were passing under one 

 corner and so we had one large colony instead 

 of two with a crooked Queen as their only 

 hope. We have before thought we wanted no 

 more divided hives, yet division boards can 

 be made perfectly safe we suppose, although 

 they have cost us some tine Queens before. 

 The other hive proved to have a young Queen 

 inside so that we have lost only one after all. 



The Green House is finished and two colo- 

 liave been in it for two days. 'Tis true they 

 will take syrup from the opposite end of the 

 room and carry it to their hives, and apart of 

 them seem contented and industrious, but by 

 far too large a part will persist in flying 

 against the glass bumping about until they 

 fall tired and exhausted to the ground. They 

 will not as yet touch the meal but have their 

 hives pretty well filled with syrup and have 

 commenced sealing it up. The very high tem- 

 perature in the middle of the day seems to 

 make them Very little inconvenience. We im- 

 agine 'tis the young bees that do the work and 

 that the old ones accustomed to the fields are 

 the ones that blunder about on the windows. 

 The walls absorb so much heat during the day 

 which they give out at night, that the air is 

 kept all night at a very comfortable tempera- 

 ture. 



Oct. 20t7i — Three more colonies have been 

 placed in the green house and we are sorry to 

 say they don't do just as we would have them. 

 They will cluster on the windows and buzz 

 about until a good many fall down on the 

 ground. Toward night the greater part of 

 them get into hives and if the glass was only a 

 foot or two above the hives very likely the 

 humming as they find their hives would call 

 all the late bees into some hive, but as for find- 

 ing their own, when so many are crowded 

 together, it looks quite doubtful. The bees in 

 the first two hives 'tis true, seem to be quite at 

 home, and flit about gathering stores etc., and 

 seemingly never touch the glass. Had they 

 all been put in after having been confined some 

 days by cold weather, that might have made 

 a difference, as it is, we have had a fine spell of 

 weather for some days. We have made one 

 discovery which is new to us at least. The 

 syrup we have been feeding is quite thin. Well 

 the two first mentioned have filled their combs 

 so well, that even the eggs one of the 

 hives contained are now crowded out. 

 This morning laden bees were going out so 

 vapidly from one of them, we thought it might 

 be they were being robbed. After a little prac- 

 tice we were enabled to follow them easily 

 on the wing, and made out unmistakably that 

 they, after dancing a while in the sunshine, dis- 

 charged from their bodies what seems to be 

 only pure water, and after this manouver they 

 returned immediately to their hive with bod- 

 ies so much reduced in size that they made 



quite a contrast to their comrades who were 

 just going out. Many bees are hopping about 

 on the ground with distended bodies seemingly 

 unable to take wing, and soon die. Does this 

 not partially explain dysentery and show why 

 it is so essential that diseased bees be allowed 

 to fly occasionally ? May it not be also that 

 this is a part of the natural process of freeing 

 the raw honey of its superfluous water? 



Many of the bees on the glass, we notice are 

 those with the distended bodies, and perhaps 

 the instinct that impels them to get a greatc r 

 distance from the hive is the cause of their 

 death. 



Oct. 21st — We put a curtain of cotton cloth 

 over the glass to-day and thus kept an even 

 temperature of about 80°; this does consider- 

 ably better. 



Three o'clock P. M. — The Queen has actually 

 laid one egg in our pet Italian Nucleus in the 

 green house. 



Oct. 22nd — That egg is gone. 



Oct. 23rd — Friend Dean has been here. He 

 very much doubts our being able to get brood 

 reared out of season by any artificial means, 

 and fears that confining bees by glass will not 

 work at all. Many bees are now dead under 

 the glass and our weak nuclei is daily getting 

 smaller although they seem to labor with an 

 industry perfectly natural. 



We really begin to think our experiment a 

 failure. We would build a larger enclosure 

 without hesitation if we thought 'twould an- 

 swer any better. Dean thinks the farther the 

 glass from the hive, the greater would be the 

 loss. As a part of the bees seem to be perfect- 

 ly at home and carry syrup from any part of 

 the room without difficulty we cannot as yet 

 agree with him. We now give them full sun- 

 shine in the morning until the temperature 

 reaches about 80», and then put down the cur- 

 tain the rest of the day, and the mortality 

 seems less. 



Oct. 24th — Gathered up all the dead bees this 

 morning that we may be enabled to see how 

 many now die daily. We found perhaps a quart. 



Ten o'clock — "Oh you little yellow busy bod- 

 ies ! Outwitted your 'Poppy,' didn't you." We 

 went to let down the curtain and our weak 

 nuclei seemed so very industrious that we 

 took a further look. The Queen and most of 

 the bees had gone over to one side of the hive 

 where we had not looked and actually had a 

 cluster of eggs nearly as large as ones hand. 

 Perhaps her Majesty objected to our counting 

 every egg as fast as it was laid. The glass 

 house may be a success yet. We gave them 

 yesterday some basswood honey for a change. 



Oct. 26th — An interesting point comes in 

 here; these bees have no pollen in their combs 

 that we can discover. To-day is the third day 

 since the eggs were laid, but none have hatch- 

 ed into larva?. If our former deductions have 

 been correct they must work on the meal or 

 there can be no larvaj. 



After dinner— How many of our readers can realize 

 the joy we felt at finding just one little bee at work on 

 the meal when we went home to dinner ? Of course 

 it went strait to the nucleus when laden. After dinner 

 two more were at work and although they each aver- 

 aged a load, say, every ten minutes, scarcely a trace of 

 it could be found in the cells at 2 o'clock. Are we not 

 right in thinking it was quickly taken into the stom- 

 achs of the nursing bees to be changed into food for 

 larvae and that we shall find larvae also, to-morrow or 

 day after? 



