May, 1916. 



American Hae Journal^ 



wise over the brood-combs of the col- 

 ony. When the nucleus combs are of 

 the same size as those of the hive, they 

 may be readily exchanged. As a rule, 

 in our German hives, separated by a 

 single board, in a house-apiary, a 

 queenless colony often joins its neigh- 

 bor through a crack between the two, 

 or if both have queens one of the 

 queens may be killed and the two colo- 

 nies peaceably united. The method 

 just given is really not an introducCion 

 but the uniting of two colonies, the 

 queenless colony being the larger of 

 the two. Where all other methods fail, 

 this gives good results. 



When a colony has killed the first 

 queen introduced to it, it will fre- 

 quently refuse to accept another, espe- 

 cially if it has been queenless for some 

 time. It is then useless to try further 

 introductions. Mr. Cowan has men- 

 tioned an occurrence, over 20 years 

 ago, in which five queens were use- 

 lessly sacrificed in this way. Mr. Bru- 

 ennich reported an analogous case in 

 the American Bee Journal of Decem- 

 ber, 1914. Ill-success should be attrib- 

 uted to abnormal conditions. The 

 longer the queenlessness the more diffi- 

 cult the cure, because the bees become 

 accustomed to their condition arid lose 

 even the energy and the desire to 

 change it. They have grown old and 

 nurses are lacking. Such colonies had 

 best be treated by the method used 

 with queenless colonies at the end of 

 winter ; they must be united to others. 

 The nucleus method is the proper one 

 for this purpcrse as the small colony is 

 sufficient to save the other. 

 Zurich, Switzerland. 



Disaster in Shipping Bees 



BY GEO. F. HAYES. 



ABOUT Aug. 8, 1915, I was con- 

 fronted with the problem of mov- 

 ing three colonies of bees from a 

 point in Illinois to southern Minne- 

 sota, about 300 miles. 



My better judgment told me I should 

 not take the bees. But I was going 

 myself. I had given them pure queens, 

 and had experimented with them; in 

 fact, lived with them for two years, 

 and I simply could not leave them be- 

 hind. And, anyway, bees could be 

 shipped successfully, for the bee litera- 

 ture said so. 



Accordingly they were prepared for 

 shipment. The covers were removed 

 and wire-cloth nailed over the top. 

 The entrances were closed in the same 

 way. I tried to follow all the direc- 

 tions except I did not pour water upon 

 the bees before shipping them. Each 

 hive had two supers and enough honey 

 to make the three weigh 250 pounds. 

 They were started by express Sunday 

 morning, and I was anxiously awaiting 

 them Monday evening when they ar- 

 rived. 



All were powerful colonies when 

 they were packed, but, alas ! only one 

 contained live bees when I opened 

 them. The queen and a handful of 

 bees had found a dry corner and hud- 

 dled into it. In all of the hives the 

 combs were broken down and the 

 honey had run out at the entrances. 



I was keenly disappointed and was 

 bitter against the express company, 

 for I supposed the disaster was due en- 



tirely to rough handling. However, I 

 was not discouraged. I was deter- 

 mined to save my pure-bred queen and 

 her handful of golden bees. I imme- 

 diately bought a colony of black bees 

 not more than three blocks from 

 home. In the cool of the morning I 

 closed the entrance with a cloth and 

 carried the hive (which was heavy) 

 home on my shoulder. I intended to 

 replace the black queen with the golden 

 Italian. 



When I reached home I was again 

 rudely disappointed to find that three 

 of the combs had broken down and the 

 bees were drowning. The hive had 

 not been closed more than ten minutes 

 and it had had the most careful hand- 

 ling. However, I saved enough bees 

 to make a strong colony by winter. 



Experience is a dear teacher but a 

 good one. I learned that bees cannot 

 be shipped in hot weather if the hives 

 contain honey. In a few minutes a 

 confined colony will generate enough 

 heat to melt down the heavy combs. 

 For this bit of information I sacrificed 

 three colonies of bees, paid $6.00 to the 

 express company and $2.50 for that last 

 colony; and in addition I had to apolo- 

 gize to the express agent for falsely 

 accusing his co-workers of careless- 

 ness. 



If this enables some brother to avoid 

 a similar experience I will console my- 

 self with the thought that my sad ex- 

 perience was not in vain. 



Elgin, Minn. 



Clipping Queens 



BY J. L. BYER. 



THE time for the first general over- 

 hauling of colonies here in the 

 North is here again. The hunting 

 of the queens so as to be sure that all 

 are clipped constitutes the greatest 

 part of the work at this examination. 

 Please note that I say " all," for unless 

 all of the queens are clipped I hardly 

 think it worth while to bother taking 

 ofT the wings of any. 



On page 98, March issue, the ques- 

 tion is asked from Indiana, why some 

 writer, un-named, said that all should 

 be clipped, and further added as a sort 

 of mystifier, " If you don't know why 

 try it and you will learn why." Dr. 

 Miller, in reply, says that he does not 

 see why it would not work all right to 

 have only part of them clipped. As I 

 have more than once made the state- 

 ment both in private and public that it 

 is necessary to have all clipped or 

 none, a word in explanation is neces- 

 sary. 



First, I want to say once more what 

 has already been told to beginners 

 hundreds of times, that clipping queens 

 in no way stops swarming ; it simply 

 provides a way to control this problem, 

 and in the case of outapiaries I think 

 that nine out of ten apiarists would not 

 know how to manage the business un- 

 less queens were clipped. Under nor- 

 mal conditions, as all bee-keepers of 

 experience are aware, the old queen 

 issues with the first or prime swarm, 

 leaving young queens developing in 

 the hive. If the swarm issues with an 

 undipped queen, and the apiarist is 

 not there, of course bees, queen and all 

 are lost. If the swarm issues with a 



clipped queen, quite often after the 

 bees have returned to the hive the 

 clipped queen will find her way back 

 into the hive again and the process of 

 swarming will be repeated again the 

 next day. I have heard of swarms 

 coming out this way for three days in 

 succession. However, in the event of 

 the queen being lost during the first or 

 subsequent swarming of the colony, 

 the bees will return to the hive and no 

 swarming will again be possible until 

 the first young queen hatches and goes 

 with them. But as there will be from 

 six to ten days of interval before a 

 young queen hatches, the apiarist will 

 have time to discover that things are 

 not as they should be in the hive, and 

 measures will be taken to handle the 

 situation and prevent any more swarm- 

 ing with the chance of losing the bees. 

 Under normal conditions a swarm may 

 be expected to issue in about nine or 

 ten days after first swarming, in case 

 the old queen was then lost, but some- 

 times swarms are held back for a few 

 days on account of bad weather, and 

 then the second swarming occurs ear- 

 lier, as during the period of waiting 

 for fair weather the started queen-cells 

 will be maturing all the time. 



Of course, this condition is more apt 

 to occur in outyards where no one is 

 in attendance, but even for a home api- 

 ary the practice of clipping is a great 

 labor saver. Who has not had swarms 

 issue on a real hot day, and probably 

 cluster on the top of a tree ? Perhaps to 

 make things more aggravating the 

 bees persist on alighting on a tree 

 trunk or large limb. With clipped 

 queens all that is necessary when a 

 a swarm issues is to get a hive ready, 

 and while the swarm is in the air lift 

 off the parent hive and set it aside, 

 placing the prepared hive on the old 

 stand. The queen of course has been 

 picked up and placed in a wire-cloth 

 cage. , 



As the bees miss their queen and 

 come rushing back, how simple and 

 easy to just place the qneefi at the en- 

 trance and allow bees and all to rush 

 in ! Supers from the old hive, includ- 

 ing bees and all, can be placed on new 

 hive on the old stand, and the job is 

 done. All this is common practice 

 with experienced beekeepers, and is 

 simply given for the benefit of begin- 

 ners constantly joining the craft. 



But to return to the question as to 

 why it is necessary to clip all, really 

 the temptation is strong to repeat the 

 advice " try it and learn why," for by 

 so doing the matter wo^ld be cleared 

 up so much plainer than by words, if 

 things turned out as they did twice in 

 my experience, when part of the yard 

 was clipped and we happened to have 

 heavy swarming seasons. A colony 

 would swarm having a clipped queen. 

 Just about the time we picked up the 

 queen in a cage and thought of chang- 

 ing hives around, out would come a 

 swarm with undipped queen, and of 

 course all would go together. It was 

 impossible to separate the bees with 

 any degree of satisfaction, and one 

 never was sure but what the undipped 

 queen might be shaken with the bees 

 if any attempt was made to divide 

 them. Swarms will sometimes mix up 

 when all have undipped queens, but 

 they will not mix half so badly as 

 when part are clipped and part un- 



