1879 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



221 



them. As I hare said all along, beware of 

 robbers, or you will speedily make two col- 

 onies into none at all, instead of into one. 



WHAT TO DO WITH THE QUEENS. 



If one of the colonies to be united has been 

 several days queenless, all the better ; for a 

 queenless colony will often give up its local- 

 ity and accept a new one, by simply shaking 

 them in front of a hive containing a laying 

 queen. From a hive containing neither 

 queen nor brood, I have induced the whole 

 lot to desert, and go over to a neighboring 

 colony, by simply shaking the bees in front 

 of it. They were so overjoyed at finding a 

 laying queen, that they called all their com- 

 rades to the new home, and all hands set to 

 work and carried every drop of honey to the 

 hive with the fertile queen. By taking ad- 

 vantage of this disposition we can often 

 make short work of uniting. If you are in 

 a hurry, or do not care for the queens, you 

 can unite without paying any attention to 

 them, and one will be killed; but, as even a 

 hybrid queen is now worth 50c, I do not 

 think it pays to kill them. Remove the 

 poorest one and keep her safely caged, until 

 you are sure the other is well received by 

 the bees. If she is killed, as is sometimes 

 the case, you have the other to replace her. 

 Where stocks are several rods apart, they 

 are often moved a couple of feet a day while 

 the bees are flying briskly, until they are 

 side by side, and then united as we have di- 

 rected. This is so much trouble, that I 

 much prefer waiting for cold w r eather. If 

 your bees are in box hives, I should say your 

 first job on hand is to transfer them. If 

 you have several kinds of hives in your 

 apiary, you are about as badly off, and the 

 remedy is to throw away all but one. My 

 friends, those of you who are buying every 

 patent hive that comes along, and putting 

 your bees into them, you little know how 

 much trouble and bother you are making 

 yourselves for the years to come. 



In conclusion, I would advise deferring 

 the uniting of your bees until we have sev- 

 eral cold rainy days, in Oct., for instance, on 

 which bees will not fly. Then proceed as 

 directed. If you have followed the advice I 

 have given, you will have little uniting to 

 do, except with the queen rearing nuclei; 

 and with these, you have only to take the 

 hives away, and set the frames in the hive 

 below, when you are done with them. If 

 the hive below is a strong one, as it should 

 of course be, just set the frames from the 

 nucleus into the upper story, until all the 

 brood has hatched. If you wish to make a 



colony of the various nuclei, collect them 

 during a cold day, and put them all into one 

 hive. If you have bees from 3 or 4, they will 

 mute better than if they came from only two 

 hives, and you will seldom see a bee go back 

 to his old home. A beginner should beware 

 of having many weak colonies in the fall, to 

 be united. It is much safer, to have them 

 all strong and ready for winter, long before 

 winter comes. 



UNITING NEW SWAIOIK. 



This is so easily done, that I hardly need 

 give directions ; in fact, if two swarms come 

 out at the same time, they are almost sure 

 to unite, and I do not know that I ever heard 

 of two such swarms quarreling. One of the 

 queens will very soon be killed, but you may 

 easily find the extra one, by looking for the 

 ball of bees that will be found clinging about 

 her, very soon after the bees have been join- 

 ed together. A swarm can almost always 

 be given without trouble, to any swarm that 

 has come out the day previous, and if you 

 will take the trouble to watch them a little, 

 you may unite any swarm with any other 

 new swarm, even if it came out a week or 

 more before. Smoke them when inclined to 

 fight, as I told you before, and make them 

 be good to the new comers. 



UNITING BEES IN THE SPRING. 



Since our spring dwindling troubles, it has 

 been quite customary to unite a stock that 

 has become queenless to one having a 

 queen, or to unite two or more weak stocks, 

 to enable them to go through the spring 

 months. The process is much like uniting 

 in the fall. Lift out the frames and put 

 them together, watching to see that they 

 are friendly to the new comers. Bees are 

 often united in the spring for the purpose of 

 securing great results in honey, and by unit- 

 ing the bees and brood, great amounts may 

 be obtained from what might be called a 

 single swarm. 



VEILS. The use of a veil over the face 

 will often give a beginner a sense of security 

 that will enable him to work to much better 

 advantage than he would, if continually in 

 fear of every bee that chanced to buzz near 

 him. I well remember the long breath of re- 

 lief which I drew, when first safely ensconced 

 in the wire cloth fixture that Langstroth de- 

 scribes and recommends in his book. It was 

 so ponderous and unwieldy, that a .friend 

 who had come to see my bees, named it the 

 "bird cage'' when he volunteered to help me 

 introduce my first Italian queen, if I woidd 

 furnish him with one like my own, to put 

 over his head. After a little practice and 



