318 



September, 1915. 



American l^ee Journal 



ten frames of foundation all drawn out and 

 chock-full of honey and brood, I now intend 

 to put on a super of sections with full sheets 

 of foundation, with the hope of securing a 

 little surplus before the flow ceases. 



1. What would have been the proper 

 course to pursue under the circumstances ? 



2. How can I tell whether my bees are hy- 

 brid.'i or Italians ? 



3. Would it be practical or advisable to 

 divide this colony for increase, or is it too 

 late in the season ? I can only see them 

 about once a week. Almost all of the bees 

 are i-banded or leather colored, but I no- 

 ticed a few that were black and smaller. 



Pennsylvania. 



Answ'ERs.— I. You brought your bees to 

 their permanent location five days after 

 they were hived, and at that time you should 

 have given them the super with a bait sec- 

 tion in it. That would be abou the same as 

 giving the super from the patent. 



2, If they are Italians they should have 

 three yellow bands, although the band near- 

 est the head does not show very distinctly. 



3. Yes. you have time enough to divide, 

 and if there is a fair fall flow you should 

 have two colonies ready for winter. 



Packing in Single-Walled Hives 



Why not ? It can be done with less ex- 

 pense; for the apiarist it's more convenient, 

 and for the bees it's more advantageous. 



(•/) Less lumber is used, less packing is 

 used for same results, and much less work 

 is used in caring for the same. 



(M Kor spring work, your hives are sepa- 

 rate. In locating early in out-yards, you 

 don't have to unpack, and your devices for 

 packing are much more easily handled. 



(i The bees are placed in a vertical hive 

 instead of a horizontal hive. Bees can move 

 cluster up and down in the hive much more 

 readily than across the combs. The honey 

 is more accessible. In the spring there will 

 be no damp moldy combs at one side of the 

 hive while the bees occupy the other. 



How it's done. I use the divisible brood- 

 chamber. /. f . the shallow super 4^4 inches 

 deep. When the work is done in tall I take 

 three such supers, placing six combs in the 

 center of each, six of the heaviest combs at 

 the top, two heavy combs at the sides in the 



for base ixi'Axib inches, two sides 1x1x20 for 

 back. 18 inches tor front, at top of the ixi a 

 slope to % inches is made to come under the 

 cover. These sticks are notched down one- 

 half and nailed together. On the outside 

 tarred paper is used, on the inside burlap, 

 placing my packing between. Then I use 

 baling wire and tie front cushion to back. If 

 well done you have a warmer, a more con- 

 venient and a cheaper hive than any double 

 wall hive made. R. B. Davis. 



Staunton. Iowa. 



Bee Escapes of Wire Cloth 



J. E. Crane asks in the American Bee 

 Journal for July, page 231. about bee-escapes 

 made of wire cloth instead of board. I have 

 used this kind of an escape for several 

 years, and with me I think they are as near 

 perfect as possible. I use the Heddon divisi- 

 ble brood-chamber hive. H and 12 frame, with 

 top and bottom hxii-ib inches. As a matter 

 of course, during a rush of honey, the spaces 



APIARY OK CARL H. TUDOR, AT DEKALB. ILL. 



center, filling in the center the best I have 

 left, leaving at the bottom six combs as I 

 find them, thus removing two of the poorer 

 combs from the hive. 



I place two !i-inch division boards on each 

 side of the bees, throwing over and binding 

 these boards together with burlap. I press 

 my packing material down tight on each 

 side of the bees '2}4 inches of packing . put 

 on super, fill same, and we are ready for the 

 ends. 



I place cushions on ends made thus: Stick 



between 'excluders and frames are filled 

 with bur combs and more or less honey. 

 When I used boards for escapes sometimes 

 the honey would cover the board so badly 

 the escapes would be clogged so the bees 

 would drown, and in very hot weather they 

 would smother but with the wire cloth all 

 is dry. 



I have never had the Porter escape fail to 

 work with the wire cloth. I take off all my 

 honey from about 500 colonies with them, or 

 the most of it. The old ones I am constantly 



changing 



1 was amused to read the experiences of 

 some of the bee-men moving bees. I am 

 situated along the Sacramento river. I do 

 all my extracting on a barge, rigged with a 

 wire cloth tent. 12x21 inches; an extractor 

 with eight baskets, each basket holding two 

 frames, run with a gas engine. The extrac- 

 tor reverses under full speed. Honey is let 

 down to barge on a track and car. When 

 one yard is extracted I go to the next. If I 

 wish to move the bees. I load up after the 

 bees stop flying at night. I hitch on the gaso- 

 line launch and go to the next yard. No fast- 

 ening in hives; no combs to fasten, only run 

 the hives down on the wheelbarrow and go 

 ahead.* 



I am rigging the engine that runs the ex- 

 tractor with a drum to wind up the rope to 

 draw the bees and empty combs back to the 

 shore. The only drawback we have is Euro- 

 pean foulbrood. which has just made its ap- 

 pearance here. American foulbrood having 

 been cleaned out. A. E. Wilbur. 



Broderick, Calif.. July 20. 



Good Honey Flow 



I am a farmer beekeeper helping my 

 father on a large farm. I have 30 colonies of 

 bees, and have now 1300 pounds of extracted 

 honey. 



The honey flow is good here this year, but 

 we have too much rainy weather. 



Winona, Minn.. Aug. 3. J. J Ellers. 



Too Much Rain 



Bees have been storing honey for the past 

 four or five weeks, but there has been too 

 much rain; only about two or three days in 

 a week may be called good honey days. 



Hoopeston. 111.. Aug. 2. G. T. Willis. 



Cleaning Up in DeKalb 



Attached is a photograph of Carl H. 

 Tudor's apiary at DeKalb. III. This is so 

 well kept that I think some mention of it is 

 necessary. DeKalb has had its scourge of 

 American foulbrood, and has been cleaned 

 up. but it now has one case of P.^uropean 

 foulbrood in town. There are over 400 colo- 

 nies kept in the city limits. J. E. Pyles. 



Putnam. III.. July 28. 



Bees Did Fairly 'Well 



My bees have done fairly well through all 

 the rains we have had. and the honey is of a 

 fine quality and white as snow. Some colo- 

 nies have as high as 70 pounds of fine comb 

 honey, but the flow is slack now and about 

 over. It IS mostly sweet clover,; 



Louis Werner, 



Edwardsville, III.. July 20. 



Prospects Spoiled 



In Oakland Co.. Mich , the prospect for a 

 big crop is spoiled by 13 days of rain up to 

 date, and it is still raining. Two weeks ago 

 the prospects were excellent, with two to 

 four supers of finished comb honey per col- 

 ony. Bees are still drawing out combs and 

 storing. Rains have brought another clover 

 bloom, but with the temperature ranging 

 from 60 to 75 degrees, and rainine nearly 

 every day, bees were not gathering enough 

 to keep up brood-rearing. Feeding is neces- 

 sary to keep colonies in a condition for the 

 buckwheat flow, which will be on in 10 days. 



Buckwheat is plentiful, and we are hoping 

 for favorable weather so the bees can make 

 up for the loss in the clover flo\y. Farmers 

 are also suffering from the bad weather, 

 with field after field of hay and grain cut 

 and shocked. Oats are pounded flat by the 

 rains. Potato bugs are making a clean sweep 

 over many fields of potatoes, and insects are 

 getting in their bad work on the apples. If 

 the weather becomes favorable there will 

 be a heavy bloom on the second crop of 

 red clover. Sweet clover is carrying the 

 heaviest bloom I ever saw. 



W. L. Loveioy. 



Clarkston. Mich.. Aug. i. 



Half a Crop in Nevada 



The honey crop is rather poor in the 

 eastern part of Nevada. We had a cold. 

 late spring followed by extremely dry. hot 

 weather. 'Ihere will be about half a crop. 



Malleck, Nev.. Aug. 16, J, K. Patton. 



