AtausT, 1919 



a L E A N 1 N G S IN B E K CULT U K E 



525 



HEA DS "OF GRAIN T DpOgHTDI FFERENT FIELDS 



long a period of rainy weather. The sum- 

 mering must be the most important and 

 most difficult problem in place of wintering 

 for us. Of course, the feeding of sugar 

 syrup, combs of honey, and supplying arti- 

 ficial pollen may be done, but that is ex- 

 pensive. If the colonies are left with plenty 

 of breeding room and plenty of stores, breed- 

 ing produces a great many bees and this 

 uses much honey. Some practice going with 

 their bees for another honey flow in the 

 north part of the country or any other spe- 

 cial locality. Some practice destroying su- 

 perfluous bees out of necessity to carry thru 

 the bees' strength for autumn increasing. 



In place of destroying those superfluous 

 bees, some are intending lately to sell in 

 pound packages to any fellow beekeeper in 

 their locality. Other beekeepers make, with 

 superfluous bees, a new colony, and some 

 allow wax production in a new hive without 

 giving any comb foundation; and there are 

 some expert beekeepers who practice to pre- 

 vent or to control breeding and egg-laying 

 in the honey season by using a queen-cage. 

 In place of the queen-cage some experts use 

 a queen-excluder between the super and 

 brood-box, and two frame-shaped queen-ex- 

 cluders in the brood-chamber to limit the 

 queen 's laying to one, two, or three combs. 



Moreover, some experts manage with vir- 

 gin queens in the place of fertilized queens 

 during the honey-harvesting season. Some 

 even dequeen the colony, altho there are 

 some troubles with queen-cells, and deroga- 

 tion of bees ' spirit to work. At all events, 

 it is believed that is an effective and profit- 

 able plan for extracted-honey production 

 and "summering" of bees, because non- 

 breeding or limiting of laying is an economy 

 of the bees' energy, utilizing the breeding 

 force to the gathering of honey and increas- 

 ing hive capacity by supplying so many 

 comb cells without brood. Therefore the 

 smaller force of bees to pass the summer 

 months is economy. Is it not so? 



But the colony, being reduced in numbers 

 of bees, must be increased for autumn work 

 upon fall flowers, and to go wintering with 

 abundant stores and a multitudinous force. 

 To do this, of course we treat them as in 

 spring. 



Summering, autumning, wintering, and 

 springing ought to be done well, of course. 

 In some localities, as in our own, "sum- 

 mering ' ' should be considered as a real prob- 

 lem at least. Is it not so? 



Yasuo Hiratsuka. 



Tara, Gifu-ken, Japan. 





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THE BACK LOT BUZZER. 

 Ua says she wishes they'd hnirry up and settle who's goin' to be queen in that hive by the apple tree. 

 They've swarmed so often that then- is nothin' left in the old home bvt Bolsheviki. 



