October, 1919 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CUIjTURE 



675 



or less drifting. If bees are flying more 

 freely from one eolony than from the one 

 next to it, returning boos from both colo- 

 nies are inclined to enter with the crowd. 

 Again, don 't you think that if hive No. 13, 

 mentioned in your Stray Straws, page 658, 

 had contained a real colony, perhaps the 

 queen of No. 14 would have been balled? 

 Well, of course that is only a guess. But 

 on account of the weather and various other 

 factors, swarms do occasionally issue, even 

 with the best of care. Now, suppose one is 

 not right there to attend to the matter, 

 would not a clipped queen that issued from 

 group in Fig. 3 be more apt to be balled 

 than one from either of the other groups? 

 In fact, this might happen to her when she 

 was no more than a foot from her own en- 

 trance. Now, since our own apiaries are 

 visited but once every seven or eight days 

 during the summer, this objection would 

 have considerable weight with us. There is, 

 however, another still stronger objection; 

 and that is, the greater ease of spreading 

 disease, especially American foul brood. We 

 have noticed at different times that, if a 

 colony has the disease, the nearest one fac- 

 ing in the same direction is apt to have it 

 later on. It is an easy matter for bees 

 loaded with diseased honey to enter a near 

 hive facing in the same direction. 



Question. — On page 367, June, C. L. N. Pear- 

 son speaks of his method of swarm prevention, and 

 I wish to ask about w'hat time the shallow super is 

 placed underneath the brood-chamber. 



Minnesota. J. N. Nelson. 



Answer. — We believe the shallow super is 

 put underneath just before the main honey 

 flow; but there will be no particular harm 

 done if it is placed there even earlier than 

 that, for of course the heat will rise 

 to the upper part of the hive, so that having 

 the shallow super underneath will make but 

 little difference anyway in the temperature 

 of the bees. 



Question. — On page 293 of Gleanings for May, 

 1918, you gave a tube method of treatment of 

 Ameiican foul brood whereby you use full sheets of 

 foundation. .Another scheme for combating this 

 form of foul brood is to shake the bees on sealed 

 combs of honey after brood-rearing has ceased in 

 the fall. Are there any objections to combining the 

 two meithods and transferring the bees from the old 

 hive to the new one with the combs of honey by 

 means of the tin tube and the bee-escape ? 



New York. C. R. Osborne. 



Answer. — Altho we have never tried the 

 plan of shaking on to combs of sealed hon- 

 ey we know the plan has been tried by 

 some. If one could be certain that the 

 frames of combs were entirely sealed, we 

 believe it would be safe to use this method: 

 but there is always a chance that there may 

 be cells here and there around the edges 

 where the bees might possibly store a little 

 more honey; and if any foul-brood honey is 

 stored in the bottoms of the cells, and left 

 there until spring, then one may be certain 

 of a continuation of the disease. If the 

 cells were left near the center of the hive 



it would not be so bad, provided the queen 

 had stopped laying for the season, because 

 the honey thus placed would be used up be- 

 fore spring. However, queens after they 

 have ceased laying sometimes begin again 

 quite late, so that, altho we have never 

 tried the plan, it does not seem quite safe 

 to us. If you try the plan we shall be very 

 much interested to learn the result. We 

 ourselves intend trying the plan on a few 

 colonies this fall. There is no reason why 

 it could not be used in connection with the 

 tube plan; but, since the brood would be al- 

 ready hatched, there would not be as much 

 advantage in the tube treatment as earlier 

 in the season. 



Question. — Why are you or the beekeepers so 

 an.xious to get more and more new beekeepers start- 

 ed ? It se«ms funny to me that in any other busi- 

 ness the hardest thing to find out is the profits, 

 .lust try to find out the profits of the beef, steel, oil, 

 or any other trust ; or just try to get in their line 

 of business and see how quick they will have you 

 out again. Beekeepers must be either the most hon- 

 est men on earth or the biggest fools. Or are their 

 profits so easily made that they are so glad about it 

 that they feel compelled to tell others? 



New York. John Buchanan. 



Answer. — A great many of the good bee- 

 keepers do not tell their yearly income, from 

 the very justifiable fear that others will 

 move in and overstock their locality. In 

 fact, there are a number of beekeepers who 

 do not hesitate to give the impression that 

 their localities are unusually poor. Please 

 note one of our items under ' ' Bees, Men, 

 and Things," in the September issue. We 

 would hardly call beekeepers the most hon- 

 est men on earth nor the biggest fools; but 

 they clearly understand the vast amounts 

 of nectar that are yearly going to waste. 

 They also know that only a small amount 

 of honey is used in proportion to the amount 

 that people could easily use to their advan- 

 tage. This being the case, the beekeepers 

 have no right greatly to fear over-produc- 

 tion. If, therefore, they have found profit 

 and enjoyment in beekeeping, is it not natu- 

 ral that they should be glad to have others 

 also embark in the same business if they 

 feel it can be done without overcrowding 

 their own territory? Altho a few beekeep- 

 ers are jealous of their occupation, and en- 

 deavor to keep as many as possible out of 

 the business, yet the great majority of bee- 

 keepers will be found quite generous and 

 friendly to the beginner. 



Question. — ^^\nien a colony dies, is the queen the 

 last to die? T. Hamilton. 



Oklahoma. 



Answer. — When a colony gradually dies, 

 the bees left continue to take care of the 

 queen as best they can, so that she is gen- 

 erally one of the last to perish. 



Question. — Will the soil from a patch of red 

 clover do to inoculate the ground for sweet clover? 

 North Carolina. E. D. Harper. 



Answer. — On referring the matter to A. I. 

 Root he says it would not. 



