36 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Jan. 1 



part will be either on the honey-board or in 

 (me of the sections of brood-chamber treated, 

 and should go with this hive, which is now 

 placed upon a new stand. 



We now have the bees of the two hives in 

 one hive with the other queen; and if left in 

 this condition when working for comb honey 

 they will soon cast a swarm, so we will pro- 

 ceed with this hive exactly as with the other, 

 except that in this case all the bees as well 

 as the queen are driven into an empty hive 

 consisting of two sections of brood-chambers 

 with frames filled full of foundation. This 

 hive, having been previously placed below 

 and on the bottom-board previously occupied 

 liy the colony treated, it will remain there. 

 The hives containing combs of brood and hon- 

 ey, but no bees, may be tiered up seven or 

 eight high to be drawn on when desired. 



In 48 hours after treating, a queen-exclud- 

 ing honey-board is placed upon the hive con- 

 taining the driven swarm, and upon this a 

 super of sections filled with foundation: after 

 which the bottom section of brood-chamber 

 is removed, and the bees shaken out in front 

 of the hive. 



Our object in hiving the bees in the first 

 place in two sections of brood-chamber was 

 to prevent them from swarming out the next 

 day, as they are almost certain to do if hived 

 directly into a contracted hive; and our ob- 

 ject in removing the bottom section of brood- 

 chamber after tne bees have settled down to 

 work, and given up the idea of swarming, is 

 to contract the brood-chamber so as to force 

 the bees to begin work in the sections at 

 once; and as soon as the work has well be- 

 gun in the sections, more room may be given 

 by adding another section of brood-chamber 

 containing either combs of honey or combs 

 of brood from the piles that were tiered up, 

 or frames of foundation, at the discretion of 

 the operator; and, according to the probable 

 duration of the honey-flow, such should in 

 every case be placed at the bottom, and di- 

 rectly upon the bottom-board, and in no case 

 should more than two sections of brood- 

 chamber be given with one queen during the 

 honey-flow. 



If the honey- flow be of long duration it 

 may become necessary, in order to prevent 

 swarming, to remove one of the sections of 

 the brood-chamber, giving in its stead one 

 containing frames tilled with foundation. 

 In this case the empty brood-section should 

 always be placed at the top of the brood- 

 chamber. The queen-excluding honey- board 

 should be removed as soon as the brood-nest 

 is well established and work has well begun 

 in the sections. 



We have found that, with a honey-flow 

 lasting four weeks, these extra strong colo- 

 nies will often make preparations to swarm 

 again unless room is given in the brood- 

 chamber by exchanging frames of brood and 

 honey for empty frames, as stated above. 

 This is on account of the top section of the 

 brood-chamber becoming somewhat clogged 

 with honey. Colonies treated as above will, 

 during a good honey-flow, roll up an amount 

 of comb honey that will astonish some of the 



oldtimers who can see no advantages either 

 in contraction or in the two-queen system. 

 "Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be 

 wise.'' 



I would especially recommend the system, 

 as outlined in this article, for beginners, and 

 especially in locations having a fair to good 

 honey-flow, in preference to the one outlined 

 in my season's work with the sectional hive, 

 whicn, being somewhat complicated, is bet- 

 ter suited for the expert honey-producer, and 

 in locations where it is not possible to secure 

 a crop of comb honey by the usual methods. 



The descriptions of these hive manipula- 

 tions are, of necessity, somewhat tedious in 

 order to make every thing plain, although 

 the manipulatione themselves are very rapid. 



This article is already long, and yet the 

 subject is not finished. With the editor's 

 permission I will finish it in the next issue. 



THE PLURAL-QUEEN SYSTEM. 



A Protest Ag^ainst the Plan; Time and 

 Money Should be Spent in Breeding Bet- 

 ter Queens Rather tlian in Striving to 

 Make a Lot of Poor Queens Live Together. 



BY WM. M. WHITNEY. 



M?-. Editor: — The discovery of plurality of 

 queens in the sarne hive seems to be attract- 

 ing attention, and causing no small degree 

 of surprise, even among old and experienced 

 bee-keepers. It seems somewhat strange 

 that this should be so, as it is a well-known 

 fact that other than mother and daughter 

 have been found in the same hive living 

 peaceably together. If I'm not mistaken, I 

 have read somewhere of an exhibition at 

 some fair in Europe of a hive of bees with 

 four queens living in harmony together. 

 Also, in the third edition of Langstroth by 

 Dadant, on page 222, there is a very inter- 

 esting account of five colonies occupying 

 one hive, and the same account is repeated 

 in the last revision. It may be said that 

 these colonies occupied different portions of 

 the hive, and acted entirely independently 

 of each other; but the fact remains that they 

 must have had the same scent, and the bees 

 must have mingled, or were likely to have 

 mingled more or less together during the 

 time of their occupancy of the hive, and 

 must have had an opportunity to destroy 

 either of these queens. 



In 1898 I thought to experiment alon^ this 

 line, and for the purpose made what is known 

 as a jumbo hive, two stories and double- 

 walled, to contain 16 frames in the brood- 

 chamber, with perforated zinc division-board 

 in the center. With this arrangement I 

 thought to secure, if two queens could be 

 made to live in peace, a large amount of 

 surplus comb honey. After two failures I 

 succeeded in securing queens that the bees 

 tolerated, but not a section of honey did I 

 get from that hive, notwithstanding the sea- 



