378 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



June 11. 1903. 



experience here as well as there. But as to some of the 

 Vermont counties, I think they would make a fuss if you 

 accused them of having no white clover honey. 



THE ALABAMA "HOG" VS. THE OHIO. 



So the Alabama human hog' is captain and chief among 

 biped porcines — takes 99 cents of a "divvy" at once, and 

 then proposes to run a foot-race for the other cent. As you 

 say, I'm not pushing the claims of the Ohio hog. Let him 

 stand down the column half way to the foot. Page 287. 





Dr. Miller's Answers 





Send Questions either to the office of the American Bee Journal, 

 or to Dr. C. C. Miller, Marengo, 111. 



Queens Lost in Danz. Hives. 



I have trouble with the Danzenbaker hive. I have two colonies in 

 Danz. hives. In one the queen died. They started queen-cells and 

 hatched out, but could find no queen, so I gave them a frame of brood 

 with eggs and young brood. They did not start a queen-cell from 

 this, so I just took them and placed them over my other Danz. hive, 

 thus doubling them up. 



At that time hive No. 2 had a rattling good queen. Yesterday I 

 found some brood in the lower chamber just coming out, but there 

 were no eggs or young brood, and I could not find a queen. So queen 

 No. 2 must be dead, as well as No. 1. However, they have a sealed 

 queen-cell, which will be out in a day or so, and perhaps this 

 double colony may yet do well. I have had much trouble with queens 

 dying in the Danz. hive. I fear the frames are too shallow, and 1 

 have about come to the resolution to put no more colonies in Danz. 

 hives. I have 5 Danz. hives, and I propose using them as extracting 

 supers over a 10-frame Langstroth. 



What do you think of my opinion, that the queens die because 

 the frames are too shallow* Certainly the queen is kept much closer 

 to the entrance of the hive, and fo, nearer the cold air. At present I 

 am sorry I bought the Danz. hives, though when I got them first I 

 thought them first-class, but experience shows me that they are not a 

 success, at least with me. 



I lost queens from both Danz. hives last year. { lost a queen from 

 an S-frame Langstroth hive. I also pinch many bees in closing up the 

 frames of the Danz. hive, and may have pinched the queen in each 

 ■case: but that seems improbable, though not impossible. 



British Columbia. 



Answer.— I do not at all believe that the shallowness of the 

 frames had anything to do with the death of the queens. If you will 

 compare the Danz. with a hive having deeper frames, I think you will 

 find that the i|ueen lays just as near the entrance in the deep frame as 

 in the shallow one. There is some chance that the queen might be 

 killed between the close-fitting frames, but it is not probable that you 

 would happen to kill two so close together in that way. It is possible, 

 indeed prolmble, that when you put hive No. 1 over hive No. 2, there 

 was a young queen in No. 1, even though you did not find her, and 

 that caused the death of the laying queen in No. 2. Then, it would be 

 nothing strange for the young queen to be lost on her wedding-trip. 



Bee-Paralysls— Cross Bees— Dividing Colonies. 



Dr. Miller, I have picked all the meat out of the nuts you cracked 

 for me last year. I want you to crack a few more. This time it is 

 paralysis. In the early spring six of my colonies began to die. They 

 would crawl all around the hive, some on their backs, some black anil 

 shiny. All had a trembling motion. All except two colonies were 

 not close together, having three or more colonies between. I read in 

 Gleanings that sulphur sprinkled all over the combs would cure it. I 

 tried it, and this is what happened : In about three weeks, which was 

 the beginning of a good honey-flow, they quit dying. Four of them 

 began to breed up a little. The other two had good queens; they 

 kept three or four combs full of eggs, but only one now and then 

 seemed to hatch. The ones that did hatch looked more like a pea- 

 worm than a bee-larvie. I removed both queens and gave them sealed 

 cells from full-blooded Italians. They have a lot of nice sealed brood 

 now. This is what I want to know : 



1. Was it real paralysis? 



2. Did the sulphur do any good* 



3. Was it the sulphur, disease in the combs, or disease in the 

 queens, that kept the eggs from hatching? 



4. If those colonies are not cured, when will I be likely to see 

 more signs of the disease * 



.5. In 1901 I bought two queens from the same company. One 

 was tested and the other untested. Both were Carniolan. The un- 

 tested one is a fine layer ; her bees are very gentle, while the tested 

 was a poor layer; her bees are very cross. All her daughters that I 

 reared last year are the same. Why was it that way, do you suppose '. 



(J. The tested queen and all her daughters except one, and this 



one's daughter, have the paralysis. They were all that did have it. 

 Is there anything strange in this? 



T. Is this race of bees more subject to paralysis than any other? 



8. Sometimes you tell beginners that have cross colonies to kill 

 the queen. If they do this and the bees rear one from her eggs, won't 

 she be cross, too? 



9. If a gentle queen is mated with one of these cross drones, won't 

 her bees be cross, too? I reared a queen from a full-blooded Holy 

 Land queen last year. She mated where there were some cross bees. 

 Her bees are about the meanest bees I ever saw. 



10. On page 281 you told Ontario to divide his bees and put the 

 old queen on the old stand. Would it not be best to put her on the 

 new stand as most of the bees will go back to the old stand? 



11. If I take a frame of brood from a colony that has pickled 

 brood, and give it to a healthy colony, will they take the disease, too? 



Alabama. 



Answers.— 1. From your description, I judge it was. 

 2. I don't know. I doubt it. 



t). 1 don't linow. It may have been neither, I confess it is a puz- 

 zling case. 



4. You may see signs of the disease any time, and you may not 

 see any more of it. 



5. I don't know just why, but it is nothing unusual to find differ- 

 ent dispositions in the same apiary, just as among folks. 



6. It is at least a striking fact, and it looks a little as if the queens 

 were to blame. 



?. Not that I know of. 



8. I think when I have advised killing the queen that I have ad- 

 vised giving another queen of gentler stock. Yet a queen of the same 

 stock would likely be an improvement, as she would meet a drone of a 

 different stock. 



9. Yes, the progeny of a drone of cross stock ought to have at 

 least. part of the disposition of said drone. 



10. Just because the field-bees will all go back to the old stand it 

 is best to have the old queen there, making that a successful colony 

 for storing. They ought not to waste time rearing a queen. 



11. Sometimes, and sometimes not. 



A Neiglibor's Bees Robbing— Buying Bees. 



1. My neighbor's bees are robbing mine. What can I do to stop 

 them? They have almost destroyed my bees. If I can't buy them, 

 what can I do to get rid of them? 



3. I must buy a few colonies. Where can I get them best? 



- Pennsylvania. 



Answers. — 1. Any wide-awake bee will rob when it gets a chance, 

 and if A's bees rob C's bees, it is not A but C who is at fault. C 

 should not allow his colonies to be weak and unprotected. It will not 

 stop the robbing if you buy the robbers, unless you brimstone them. 

 Sometimes you can stop robbing by closing the entrance so only one 

 bee can pass at a time, then piling up hay or grass about the hive and 

 keeping it soaked with water. If a colony is queenless, it may help to 

 give it a queen. This is one of the cases in which an ounce of preven- 

 tion is better than a pound of cure, and it is well to keep all colonies 

 strong, and if you happen to have a weak colony keep the entrance so 

 small that the robbers cannot get started at robbing. 



2. I don't know. It is expensive to get them from a distance on 

 account of heavy express charges, and you will prehaps be able, by in- 

 quiring, to get them close at hand. Watch the advertisements, and 

 you niay see something not far away. You might also succeed by ad- 

 vertising your wants in this journal. If obliged to get bees from a 

 distance, it will be less expensive to buy nuclei, and then build them 

 up. 



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