(Entered as secood-elass matter July 30, 1907. at the Poat-Offlee at ChicaRO, 111., nDder Act of March 3, 1879.) 



Published Monthly at $1.00 a Year, by George W. York & Company, 146 West Superior Street, 



GEORGK W. YORK. Editor 



DR. C. C. MILLER, .■\ssociate Editor. 



CHICAGO, ILL, APRIL, 1910 



Vol. L- -No. 4 



Editorial Notes and Comments 



Dr. Phillips on Foul Brood 



Franz Richter, the man who culls 

 from American bee-papers for Bienen- 

 Vater, sent a letter of inquiry concern- 

 ing foul brood to Dr. E. F. Phillips. In 

 his reply, Dr. Phillips says Italians are 

 little if any less immune to American 

 foul brood than other bees. In the 

 case of European foul brood, Italians 

 are under certain circumstances cer- 

 tainly more resistant to the disease 

 than blacks. American foul brood is 

 more difficult to combat than European. 

 Where the European variety breaks 

 out it is extremely virulent, but after 

 a time its virulence seems to abate. 

 The Alexander treatment, which is not 

 recommended by the U. S. Department, 

 gives satisfactory results only where 

 European foul brood has lost some of 

 its virulence. 



Putting One Colony Over Another 



The Alexander plan of putting a 

 weak colony over a strong one in 

 spring, for a time, has been a great 

 success by some, and a failure by 

 others. The advice is to handle the 

 hives very gently, so that the bees may 

 not be stirred up to mix together until 

 they have obtained the same hive-scent. 

 Perhaps it may be well in most cases 

 to make sure on this point, by having 

 wire-screen between the two stories 

 for a few days. In that case there is 

 no need of gentle handling, and there 

 is no possibility of harm to either queen 

 until the screen is removed. It is then 

 to be replaced by a queen-excluder. 

 What is perhaps better is to put the 

 excluder on at the start, the wire-cloth 

 over it, and then, after 3 or 4 days, 

 merely remove the wirecloth. 



Less troublesome, although not quite 

 so safe, is the plan of putting one or 

 two thicknesses of newspaper over the 

 excluder. The removal of the paper is 

 gradually made by the bees. There is 

 no need to have any entrance from the 

 outside to the upper story. The im- 



prisonment of a weak colony for a few 

 days, with the room of a whole story, 

 can do no harm. Some think it better 

 to put the weak colony under. 



Gross or Net Weight ot Honey 



Just now there is quite a to-do over 

 this matter among Canadian bee-keep- 

 ers. Some say that when a customer 

 buys a •5-pound can of honey he ex- 

 pects and should get a full-weight -5 

 pounds of honey. Others say it is the 

 usual thing in buying packages ready 

 put up that the weight of the package 

 is included, and so "a .5-pound can of 

 honey" should mean that can and 

 honey together weigh 5 pounds. Prob- 

 ably it does not matter such a great 

 deal which plan be adopted so long as 

 there is no attempt to deceive the cus- 

 tomer; only it is better that there be 

 uniformity, and the final decision of 

 our Canadian brethren, if they ever do 

 all get together, will be watched with 

 interest. 



W. Z. Hutchinson's Increase Last 

 Year 



In the forepart of June, as he relates 

 in the Review, Editor Hutchinson had, 

 last year, 20 colonies that he says were 

 really .S-frame nuclei, also -500 empty 

 combs, and about July 1 he bought 10 

 colonies of bees. VVith this capital 

 to work on, he had in the fall 41 colo- 

 nies of bees, 70 brood-combs filled with 

 honey, and so far as the report shows, 

 not a drop of salable surplus honey. 



A beginner could have increased the 

 30 colonies to 82, with at least some 

 honey to put on the market, instead of 

 having it all in brood-combs. Not only 

 could a beginner have done so, but the 

 average beginner probably would have 

 done so. •A.nd therein Mr. Hutchinson 

 showed himself not a beginner, but a 

 veteran. The beginner who should in- 

 crease to double the number of colo- 

 nies that Mr. Hutchinson reached, 

 would go into winter quarters with 



weaklings, in all probability, and come 

 out in the spring with a less num- 

 ber than would Mr. Hutchinson, those 

 that did come through needing tender 

 nursing. 



Mr. Hutchinson says fall found him 

 with 41 colonies in 10-frame hives; 

 combs fairly loaded down with honey 

 and stocked with young bees ; and up 

 to March they were wintering perfectly. 

 For every pound of honey in those 70 

 brood-frames he probably will have re- 

 turned at least 2 in surplus, if not b, 

 and the probability is that in the com- 

 ing season he will not be disappointed 

 in his expectation to make things 

 "hum." 



And all this is set down especially for 

 beginners to think over. 



Weight of Queeu-Bees 



As may be found reported in Bienen- 

 Vater, Ph. Reidenbach has for years 

 weighed all his queens, and he finds 

 the weight of a virgin to vary from 150 

 to 210 milligrams, while the weight of 

 a fertilized queen is from 230 to 300 

 mg. So when he wants to decide 

 whether a queen is a virgin or not, he 

 weighs her, and finds whether she 

 weigh less thon 210 or more than 230. 

 His chief object in weighing is to select 

 the heaviest queens as being the most 

 prolific to breed from. 



Herr Reidenbach is considered good 

 authority, but one may be pardoned for 

 questioning the wisdom of depending 

 chiefly, or indeed very much, upon the 

 weight of a queen in making selection. 

 One of the most prolific queens, if not 

 the most prolific queen, the writer ever 

 had, was one of the smallest and light- 

 est. Neither is it certain that the most 

 prolific queen is always the best. A 

 queen which lays 25 percent more eggs 

 than another is no better than the less 

 prolific queen, if the workers of the 

 latter live 25 percent longer than the 

 workers of the former. Then there are 

 other important qualities to be con- 

 sidered. 



Bees 3Iost Immune to Foul Broort 



In this country and in Australia it 

 seems to be the general opinion that 

 Italians resist foul brood more suc- 

 cessfully than blacks. .Vt least some 

 authorities in England hold the same 



