February, 1914. 



American Vae Journal 



that year, which would add greater im- 

 portance to the apiarian displays. 



The California State Beekeepers' As- 

 sociation, at its convention last year, 

 sent an invitation to the National asso- 

 ciation to assemble in San Francisco 

 during the E.xposition year. At the 

 same time the State organization took 

 steps toward preparing for its own ex- 

 hibit, and M. H. Mendleson, of Ven- 

 tura, Calif., was given charge of this 

 work. 



The idea of the two conventions was 



heartily endorsed by the Stanislaus 

 County Beekeepers' Club, a California 

 organization, and its members were 

 greatly enthused over the project. 



While it is expected that a great dis- 

 play will be made on bees, the bi-pro- 

 ducts of the industry will not be over- 

 looked. Honey, wa.x and kindred pro- 

 ducts will be given due attention in the 

 Palace of Food Products, and e.xhibits 

 from many parts of the United States 

 are expected. 



H. M. Wright. 



Bee-Keeping ^ For Women 



Conducted bv Miss Emm.\ M. Wilson. Mareneo. 111. 



More About Our Crop of Honey 



Editor Dadant is interested to know 

 something more about our crop of 

 honey, and has sent a list of questions 

 as follows : 



1. " About how many frames did 

 those bees have filled with brood at the 

 height of the breeding season ?" 



The hives used were 8-frame, and it 

 was unusual to find an outside frame 

 that contained no brood. Perhaps more 

 often were the two outside frames 

 fairly well filled. Of course, some pol- 

 len was present, but there was very 

 little honey in the brood-chambers. 

 Many of the central combs were filled 

 with brood, every cell being filled up 

 to the top-bar. Some say that with the 

 frames as deep as the Langstroth, there 

 is always a space of one or two inches 

 under the top-bars filled with pollen 

 and honey, and they make* this an ar- 

 gument for shallower frames. 



Our bees don't work that way. Dur- 

 ing the height of brood-rearing, as al- 

 ready stated, they have little or no 

 space between the brood and the top- 

 bar. Possibly in hives where it is the 

 rule to have brood one or two inches 

 below the top-bar. it is because of the 

 sagging of the foundation in the upper 

 part of the frame, stretching the cells 

 so that the queen will not use them. 

 With our foundation splints there is 

 no such sagging. A few colonies, 

 which were allowed two stories up to 

 the time of harvest, had 12 or 14 frames 

 of brood. 



2. "How do they compare with each 

 other for proportion of Italian blood, 

 and which were the best yielders, the 

 nearest to pure Italians or the nearest 

 to common bees ?" 



Yellow blood predominated, some 

 classed as " very yellow," having more 

 than three bands, ranging from that 

 down to "dark." In reporting accord- 

 ing to color, those should be left out 

 which changed queens during the sea- 

 son, since in such colonies there might 

 not be uniformity of color from first 

 to last. Of those which held the same 

 queen throughout the season : 



1 very yellow colony gave 384 sections 

 3 yellow colonies averaged 345 " 

 6 3-banded colonies aver- 

 aged 337 



10 colonies, mostly 3-band- 

 ed, averaged 316 sections 



3 hybrid colonies averaged 311 " 

 1 dark colony gave 309 " 



This seems a radical departure from 

 what prevailed a few years ago, when 

 the best storers were likely to be the 

 darkest, whereas at present there seems 

 a reversal of that rule, and the number 

 shades from 384 for the yellowest down 

 to 309 for the darkest. Now will the 



queen never went up into the sections, 

 so that there would have been no dif- 

 ference made by the use of excluders, 

 unless there should have been a slight 

 hindrance to the bees in passing 

 through them. It is only fair, how- 

 ever, to add that in the few exceptional 

 cases there were some in which ex- 

 cluders would have been a decided ad- 

 vantage, not only because a number of 

 sections were spoiled by brood, but be- 

 cause sometimes the bees fooled us by 

 putting queen-cells in the sections. In 

 that case we were helpless, as we were 

 not looking for queen-cells in sections, 

 and could hardly have seen them any- 

 way. But in nearly all cases the sec- 

 tions were taken off before the queen- 

 cells had time to hatch, there being only 

 one case during the whole season 

 where the cell actually hatched. In 

 that case there was no other brood in 

 the super; just the one queen-cell 

 alone. 



.5. "Of course they were not cross 

 while harvesting this big crop, but it 

 would be interesting to know whether 

 any of them were cross and when." 



Unfortunately it is hardly true to say 

 that " they were not cross while har- 

 vesting this big crop." There were 

 some cross bees, one colony in partic- 

 ular being very cross, and that right in 

 the height of the flow, and one of the 

 very best colonies, too. We knew 

 there were cross bees in that vicinity, 

 and the writer very strongly suspected 



The scenery is inspiring in Colorado, and you set an excellent chance to see it going 

 from one mountain valley to another. 



rule be again reversed next year ? 

 Only a year previous the two best colo- 

 nies were among the darkest. 



3. " Did you use any queen-excluders?" 



No excluders were used to keep the 

 queen from going up into the sections. 



I. " If so, did you make any compari- 

 son of results between colonies with 

 and without excluders ?" 



No comparison could be made. With 

 a very few exceptions, however, the 



the culprit, but did not want to admit 

 it, as she knew that if convicted that 

 queen's head would have to come off, 

 for Dr. Miller is merciless in that re- 

 spect. But one day it was so very 

 plainly evident that it could not be 

 ignored, so the search for her was re- 

 luctantly begun, only to disclose the 

 fact that the colony was already queen- 

 less. A new queen of best stock was 

 accordingly given, and the temper of 



