JUNE 15, 1915 



487 



GENERAL COMMESPONDENCE 



ON THE BRINK OF OWEN'S VALLEY 



BY GEORGE M. HUNTINGTON. 



The firet illustration of my beeyavd, taken 

 Sept. 1, 1913, shows the hives before the 

 supers were removed. The hive at the 

 right, without any super, is empty. The 

 season of 1913 was started with five colonies 

 and four nuclei, and ended with ten full 

 colonies and a crop of 17 eases of comb 

 honey of 24 sections each. 



The bees were flying about nearly every 

 day up to Jan. 1, 1914, which was very 

 pleasant. They had a playspell during the 

 warm part of the day ; but winter com- 

 menced that night and lasted till Feb. 1. 

 A few days later I gave them graham flour 

 and bran to work on as a pollen substitute. 

 The bees had comnienced to look over the 

 alfalfa-blossoms in the haystack, hunting 

 for pollen. I put the gi'aham and bran in 

 an empty hive with some pieces of glass, 

 partly covering the top of the hive. In an- 

 other hive I put a pan of water with excel- 

 sior in it with pieces of glass partly cover- 

 ing the top so as to give some circulation 

 of air. The hives would become too warm 

 if fully covered. The bees also used the 

 top for exit. Nearly all entered at the reg- 

 ular hive-entrances. 



Brood-rearing commenced at once. Early 

 in April 1 had to take frames of brood from 

 the strongest colonies and give some full 

 sheets in order to hold back swarming or to 

 check the queen's activities. Hive No. 8 

 had used nearly all their stores in brood- 

 rearing. Three frames of brood were i-e- 

 moved, and one empty comb, one comb of 

 honey, and one frame of foundation given 

 to replace the frames of brood. Then a 

 super with twelve cull sections of honey 

 was placed on the hive. On May 5 two 

 more frames of brood were taken away, and 

 two frames of full sheets given. 



The super with the twelve sections was 

 removed on May 12, nicely filled with fruit- 

 bloom honey. Another super was placed on 

 the hive with four bait sections. My record 

 shows that this full super was taken June 

 1 with wild-buckwheat honey and some sec- 

 tions from mixed sources. This stand of 

 bees. No. 8, can be identified in the four 

 pictures of Nov. 1st as the one w'ith twelve 

 supers, showing how it would appear with 

 the season's crop all on, 335 filled sections 

 and one bait section with comb fully drawn 

 but no honey in it. Out of the 335 sections 



G. M. Huntington's apiary, looking across Owen's Valley toward the White Mountains. 



