March. 1915. 



American Hae Journal 



known, it is anticipated that additional 

 wax rendering stations will be avail- 

 able about the country. 

 Amherst, Mass. 



[The above advice is in the right 



direction. We know by the amount of 

 combs shipped to our people that most 

 beekeepers dislike the task of render- 

 ing them. Yet they are too valuable to 

 be wasted. — Editor | 



of the workers would look the same as gold 

 ens. some the same as blacks, with perhaps 

 some intermediate. 



Dr. Miller*s 



Answers^ 



Send Questions either to the office of the American Bee Journal or direct to 



Dr. C. C. Miller, Marengo, III. 



He does not answer bee-keeping questions by mail. 



Is Fall Shipping Injurious to Bees Wintering ? 



I am consideriiiii sliippini; bees in the fall. 

 say 100 miles or more, and then giving them 

 a good llight before putlint' Ihem in the cel- 

 lar. Do you think it injurious to their win- 

 tering well to ship them in the fall ? 



Wisconsin. 



Answer. -If they have a good flight before 

 being taken in cellar. I should not expect 

 any harm from the journey. The excite- 

 ment of the journey, however, would make 

 them eat a little more, so you would have to 

 be a little more careful to see that they had 

 stores enough. 



Spring Proleclion After Wintering With Supers 

 in Cellar 



For the first season my bees are wintered 

 with supers on. 1 had to leave them on so 

 tliat my bees would not be short of stores. 

 1 would like to know if there would be a 

 way in the spring to have my bees all in one 

 single brood-chamber, so as to keep them 

 warm for the first month after they are 

 taken from the cellar ? Quebec 



Answer— If the upper story contains the 

 same kind of frames as the lower, and you 

 find Ihe bees in the upper story, it will not 

 be diliicult to lift out all frames containing 

 brood and put them in the lower story, 

 brushing in front of the hive any bees that 

 may be on the other frames. 



If the upper frames are not the same as 

 below, and vou find the brood-nest above. 

 and much brood there, then you had better 

 leave them as they are until warmer 

 weather. Indeed, in any case, seeing the 

 bees are all wrapped, it may not be a bad 

 plan to leave them just as they are until 

 warmer weather comes. 



Shipping Bees— Red Clover Workers 



1. Please send me the price of honey-bees 

 and dueens, and price of comb honey 



2. When is the best time to ship bees in 

 the spring? , , , .,, , , 



3 What kind of a bee will work on red 

 clover? West Virginia 



Answers.— I. I do not rear queens for 

 sale, although I sometimes sell a queen in 

 July. I make my money selling honey, and 

 to get the most honey I can afford to take 

 a lot of pains to rear the best queens I 

 know how. and can make more money sell- 

 ing the honey of such queens than I can 

 selling the queens themselves or their bees 

 If there is any one thing a honey producer 

 should strive for, it is to learn to improve 

 his stock by rearing queens from his best 

 stock. 



2. In freezingweather thecombs are some- 

 what brittle, and likely to break easily, and 

 the bees do not stand a journey as well as 

 when more active. When combs are filled 

 with honey they are likely to break in tran- 

 sit, and if too warm there is more danger 

 that the bees may suffocate. So the best 



time in spring is while the combs are mostly 

 empiy. any time after it is warm enough for 

 the bees to fly nearly every day. 



j. I'he common hive-bee generally gets 

 nothing from red clover because the flower 

 tube is too deep for the length of its tongue. 

 There are times, however, either because 

 the tube is not so deep as usual, or because 

 it is fuller of nectar, when a honey-bee of 

 any race will get nectar from red clover. 

 It is also true that there is a difference in 

 the length of bees' tongues, and there have 

 been bees with tongues of such length that 

 they could work on red clover when others 

 could not. Unfortunately it is impossible 

 to keep up such a strain of bees, or else 

 suflicient care to do so has not been exer- 

 cised. So at present I do not know that you 

 can find what you desire 



Miscellaneous Questions 



1. I have decided to make the production 

 and sale of extracted honey my sole occu- 

 pation. We have two flows in the fall 

 equally as good as in the spring I am going 

 to buy new hive bodies with Hoffman 

 frames. If you were in this position please 

 name the ni/e size body that you would buy ? 



2. A friend says the 4frame extractor 

 cleans the combs better and without break- 

 ing them as badly as the two frame. Is that 

 so ? 



3. My bees are wintering in two eight- 

 frame bodies, sealed cover and heavily 

 wrapped in paper. Would it be safe to 

 move them five miles on a cool day with only 

 the I's-inch entrance for ventilation ? I can't 

 move them much before the middle of 

 March. 



1 There are combs and honey in both 

 bodies. V/here will the queen start her 

 brood-nest this spring ? 



5. You say the bees will take care of their 

 own queen in a cage, but if she is caged and 

 put in another colony above the excluder 

 will those strange bees take care of her ? 



b. How will bees look that are the product 

 of a cross between a golden and a black ? 



Kentucky. 



Answers.— I. I think nothing less than lo 



frames. 



2. If each is run at the same speed. I don't 

 see why there should be any difference. It 

 takes less force to speed the lighter one up 

 to a high rate, so in the hands of a careless 

 person there might be a likelihood of greater 

 speed with the smaller one. and so more 

 danger of breaking combs. Still, this is only 

 a guess; I don t know. 



3. I think you could safely undertake it. 

 Keep watch, and if the bees show too much 

 excitement give them a sprinkling of v\'ater. 



4 Most likely where the brood-nest was 

 in the fall, and that may be in either story, 

 most likely the lower one. 



5. Generally there will be some bees so 

 good natured as to feed a strange queen, 

 but it is safer to have the cage provisioned, 

 and then the queen can feed herself. 



0. I don't know. 1 should guess that some 



Demaree Plan— Storing Empty Combs 



I would like to ask some questions about a 

 plan you mention on page 3Si of the Ameri- 

 can Bee Journal for October. 1014. which 

 you call the Demaree plan. Vou say iust 

 before swarming, put all the brood but one 

 frame in a second story over an excluder, 

 leaving the queen below with one frame of 

 brood and empty combs of frames filled 

 with foundation. 



1. Do you cut out all queen-cells at this 

 time if there are any ? 



2. Is it necessary to examine each colony 

 about every 10 days to remove queen-cells 

 afterwards f 



3. I would especially like to know how it 

 would do to raise up the top story after two 

 or three weeks ami place a super with sec- 

 tions beneath it, and then if theseason were 

 good just keep on adding more comb supers 

 as needed, always placing the empty one 

 underneath, the same as when running for 

 comb honey onh ; that is. I would like to get 

 dll section honey except the one top story 



Two Colonies of K. F. Rehberg. in the 

 City of New Haven, Conn. 



of full frames. Do you think this could be 

 done ? 



4. How can I keep empty combs from one 

 season to another and not have them de- 

 stroyed by the wax moths ? Iowa. 



Answers — i. Yes. 



2. Generally it ought not to be. The idea 

 is that the bees are in the same condition as 

 if they had swarmed naturally. Of course, 

 it sometimes happens that when a natural 

 swarm is hived it throws off a swarm the 

 same season, but that is exceptional. Some 

 have reported that they never have a colony 

 swarm that has been treated by the Dem- 

 aree plan, while it fails with others. You 

 can tell by trying whether it is a success 

 with you. 



3. It will work all right if the season is 

 good enough to fill both the brood-combs 

 and the sections. But you must expect that 

 so long as there is plenty of room in those 

 old combs the bees will not do very much 

 in the sections, 



4. There is no way so good as to leave idle 

 combs in the care of the bees themselves. A 

 colony not so very strong can be induced to 

 take care of four or more stories of combs. 

 Put two or three stories of combs below the 

 colony, and two or three stories above. 

 With a strong colony it will work all the 

 better; but of course it will not do for a 

 colony working on sections. 



You may also submit the combs to the 

 fumes of carbon disulfide, which will kill 

 not only the larv* of the moth but also its 

 eggs, and then if you seal up the combs 



