aURCll, 1919 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



153 



r \ 



FROM THE FIELD OF EXPERIENCE 



Figure 1 shows in the background the six- 

 foot fence on the south and the east sides 

 of the yard as well as the twelve-foot fence 

 on the north and the west. Figure 2 shows 

 the fence, which is 12 feet high on the north 

 and the west sides of the bee-yard. The stalks 

 were threaded into the wire from the out- 

 side between two wires near the top, one in 

 the center, and two near the bottom, as a 

 close view of figure 2 will show. The 12- 

 foot fence consists of a double width of six- 

 foot wire and two lengths of cornstalks. 



Perhaps almost any kind of woven net- 

 ting would answer the purpose, but figure 3 

 shows a close view of the kind I used. No- 

 tice the twist, the nature of which is such 

 that there is plenty of slack to press the 

 wires and to make room between them thru 

 which to pass the stalks. The wire was 

 listed as poultry and rabbit netting by a 

 mail-order house. Wire six feet high, heavy 

 grade, comes in ten-rod bales at 66 cents 

 per rod. The space between the wires is 

 1% inches at the bottom and 4i/4 inches at 

 the top. With this wire the stalks are easy 

 to thread. The wire plus the labor and 

 stalks and second-hand telephone poles at 

 70 cents each made me a cheap windbreak. 

 Edward Hassinger, Jr. 



Hortonville, Wis. 



QUEEN - REARING— DOES IT PAY? 



Perhaps Not in Dollars, but in Acquirement of Bee 

 Lore It Does 



Since no method has yet been discovered 

 whereby nectar can be gathered and con- 

 verted into honey by machinery, man has 

 concluded that the life and prosperity of a 

 hive depend upon a virile and protected 

 motherhood. Otherwise, worker bees, which 

 already are carrying pollen and nectar in 

 loads many times their own weight, making 

 wax, building cells, nursing younger sister 

 bees, and doing military duty, would no 

 doubt be spending their odd moments in 

 reproducing the species. 



Artificial queen-rearing, like other stock- 

 raising pursuits, is only another version of 

 making two blades of grass grow where only 

 one grew before, with the additional object 

 of improving the stock by breeding only 

 from the finest strains. Therefore, when 

 the new firm of beekeepers became estab- 

 lished, an Italian breeding queen was pur- 

 chased from which to requeen the apiary 

 and to provide queens for prospective new 

 colonies. 



Of the 415 cells grafted, 109 were capped 

 or accepted. Of these, 20 failed to hatch, 

 and were found, fully developed, dead in 

 the cells. Of the 89 that did hatch, only 36, 

 less than half, mated and began laying. 

 The other 53 virgins were lost, presumably 

 on their nuptial flights, the majority proba- 



bly being ambuscaded en route by yellow- 

 jackets, which increased to an army more 

 and more formidable as the season advanc- 

 ed. The voracious insects became a pest in 

 dwelling-houses, and a menace even to pet 

 animals — dogs and cats often being depriv- 

 ed of their rations by a sudden visitation of 

 the yellow peril, which, without a by-your- 

 leave, would swarm over the food and carry 

 off the meaty portions. Against such an 

 enemy the virgin queen is defenseless — -six 

 veteran bees, according to the observations 

 of a statistically inclined beekeeper, being 

 required to vanquish one yellow-jacket. 

 The beekeepers of England, especially near 

 London, are said by those familiar with api- 

 culture in that country, to suffer greatly 

 from losses caused by the yellow-jacket pest. 



A total of 36 queens, altho a small result 

 for a season 's work, and only 33 1/3 per 

 cent of the 109 cells capped, and 8 per cent 

 of the total number of cells grafted, was 

 still a sufficient number to requeen their 

 small apiary, had not fresh disasters, not 

 mentioned in the books, befallen them. At 

 the end of the season, artificially reared 

 queens in hives and nuclei numbered only 

 28, the other 8 queens having met their 

 death during the delicate operations of cag- 

 ing and introduction; 2 died in cages, to- 

 gether with their attendants, while in transit 

 from nuclei to their permanent homes in 

 regular hives. An inquest was held. "Sun- 

 stroke ' ' was the verdict, based on the ex- 

 pert testimony of a beeman who learned 

 that the cages had been exposed to the sun 

 during the short time necessary to open the 

 hives and spread the frames preparatory to 

 introducing the queens. There being no 

 other logical explanation, the verdict was 

 accepted. 



But the same expert had nothing definite 

 to offer when a beautiful golden queen was 

 found lying dead in front of a hive two daj's 

 after introduction. He said that bees would 

 sometimes release a queen by eating thru 

 the candy, and then execute her; but he 

 could offer no satisfactory explanation for 

 such conduct. A few days later another 

 queen met the same fate, and the hive was 

 finally requeened only by giving to it a 

 frame of brood from which the colony pro- 

 duced a queen more to their liking. 



Beginners are more or less prepared by 

 reading for the eccentricities of royalty. 

 ' ' The books say ' ' that young queens often 

 return to the wrong hives after their mat- 

 ing-flights, and that others are nervous and 

 restless when the hive is opened for inspec- 

 tion; but no account of a queen emerging 

 from a hive at one end of a row and return- 

 ing to the hive at the extreme other end, as 

 the first young queen did, has ever been 

 noted in literature. There were 19 hives in 

 a row. In hive No. 1 the queen was due to 

 begin laying, and the frames were inspected 

 for eggs. None was found, and a diligent 



