1901 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



397 



the center of the brood rather than on the out- 

 side?" 



" Because the center of the brood-nest is the 

 warmest part of the hive or colony ; and this, 

 with the removal of the honey, which the 

 bees never allow (at this time of the year) in 

 the center of the brood-nest, stimulates the 

 queen to greater activity at egg-laying than 

 otherwise would be, so that we are rushing on 

 with mighty strides toward the army of work- 

 ers which are to gather our nectar during the 

 harvest time. To this one idea of securing 

 workers in time for the harvest, every effort 

 of both the keeper and the bees is to be di- 

 rected at this time of the year if we would 

 succeed." 



"But do you not help some of the very 

 weakest colonies any ? " 



"Yes. As soon as the strongest colonies 

 have their hives full of bees and brood, or 

 even when they have eight frames full, I take 

 a frame of brood just gnawing out, and place 

 it in the next weaker ones, giving the strong- 

 er an empty comb for the queen to fill again, 

 and so keep on until all are full, if this is pos- 

 sible, before the harvest arrives." 



" But does it not injure the strongest to thus 

 take brood from them ? ' ' 



" It would were we to do this early in the 

 season ; but as we do not do this till some of 

 the colonies have their hives nearly or quite 

 filled, it does not materially weaken them, 

 but, on the contrary, stimulates the queen to 

 still greater activity at egg-laying, and at the 

 same time tends to check any desire to 

 swarm." 



"How about putting on sections? When 

 is this done? " 



" I generally put them on all good colonies 

 a week to ten days before the honey harvest is 

 to arrive, so that the bees may enter them on 

 warm days and get used to going ' upstairs.' 

 With the weaker colonies they are not put on 

 till they are ready for them, or till they are 

 confined to the brood they have at the time of 

 the opening of the harvest." 



" How are the sections prepared ? " 



" I now fill each section with the extra-thin 

 foundation, while three or four sections to 

 each hive should be those which are full of 

 comb, or nearly so (called 'bait sections'), 

 left over from the previous year, the same 

 being those which were filled hardly well 

 enough to be salable. These latter are very 

 important, as they are the means of getting 

 the bees at work in the sections at once." 



" Are not these sections filled with comb 

 finished quicker than those with foundation ? " 



"Yes. Asa rule these are finished from 

 three days to a week before the others ; and 

 where one has the time, I think it pays to 

 take these out as soon as filled, putting those 

 with foundation in their places, thereby caus- 

 ing the bees to work with renewed vigor to fill 

 up the vacant space left where the full ones 

 were taken out. But where time is scarce, or 

 where sections are handled by the full super, 

 this course can not generally be taken. This, 

 in short, is the way I have worked my bees 

 for the past 30 years, during which I have 

 been enabled to take an average of very near- 



ly 80 pounds of comb honey each year from 

 each old colony in the spring." 



HIVES ON A BENCH ; ARTIFICIAL SUBSTITUTES 

 FOR BROOD-REARING IN THE SPRING. 



1. I have my bees on a 17-ft. bench ; how 

 close can I place them ? 



2. How long can a queen hatched from a 

 cell be left in a cage ? 



3. Does a person gain any thing by feeding 

 rye meal to his bees in early spring ? 



John Schneider. 

 Manhasset, N. Y., Mar. 22. 



[1. I would not place them much closer than 

 about 6 inches. You will need room enough 

 to get your hands down between the hives to 

 handle properly. If you get the hives too 

 close there is liable to be a little trouble from 

 bees running from one entrance to the other, 

 especially young bees. In the case of a valu- 

 able queen, I would not place the hive of such 

 queen very close to that c f another. 



2. If supplied with candy she may live two 

 or three weeks (possibly she might live that 

 long without it, getting her sustenance from 

 the bees), but ordinarily not more than four 

 or five days. The older a queen is, the more 

 difiicult she is to introduce. 



3. For the average beginner, I think not ; 

 but an expert may, perhaps, at times put out an 

 artificial substitute that will prove beneficial. 

 But as a rule we may say that natural pollen 

 will come on as soon as the bees can afford to 

 use pollen. The feeding of rye meal has a 

 tendency to overload the combs and to stimu- 

 late brood -rearing at a time of year when it is 

 too cold for bees to rear much brood profit- 

 ably. More spring dwindling comes from a 

 «mall cluster trying to hover over a large 

 amount of brood in cool bad weather than 

 from any other cause. In our locality we 

 prefer to have brood-rearing kept down to as 

 small a compass a possible, until the first of 

 May ; then the bees can usually take care of 

 and keep warm all they will be likely to rear. 

 —Ed.] 



the skin of fruit v. old black cells. 



I agree with you, that the bees never pinch 

 a hole through the skin of a fruit, but I do not 

 understand why they can not do it, as they are 

 well able to cut down the cells of very old 

 comb, and sometimes they will cut the septum 

 also. Such old black cells, I think, must be 

 nearly as tough as the skin of a fruit. 



Ferdinand Wagner. 



Watertown, Wis., Mar. 21. 



[Old black cells have considerable fiber in 

 them ; and, as I have before explained, the 

 bees will pick to pieces a fibrous article just as 

 we can pick to pieces with our fingers a ma- 



