March, 1914. 



American liee Joarnal 



cases, and /« />-»«/ o/ llu- U-ft sidv for 

 those lound diseased. It treated, 1 

 move the peg to the cviiter of the en- 

 trance, and It altera week or so they 

 show no sign of disease, move the peg 

 to the iiffJit of the entrance and add 

 one peg for each examination made 

 thereafter until fall. Then if no dis- 

 ease shows, we remove all pegs. 



Previous to the honey How (clover) 

 I keep going the rounds of the yard 

 looking tor their needs, spreading their 

 brood-nests as their condition and the 

 condition of the weather will permit, 

 adding super room as needed from 

 time to tune, and equalizing by the 

 exchange of brood-frames until about 

 18 or Hu days before the expected end 

 of the honey flow. By this time most 

 of the colonies are fairly "boiling 

 over" with bees, and all drone-cells 

 are filled with larv^. Some of the 

 most forward colonies are building 

 queen-cells, and now it is time to begin 

 the dethroning operation. With a boy 

 to handle the smoker, and a man to 

 help look for the queens, we start in a 

 yard, killing all the queens that are 

 two years old, and all the others ex- 

 cept what are needed to fill hives empty 

 from winter loss or to increase if more 

 are wanted. Perhaps a colony may be 

 in such condition that it may run 

 through the season with little chance 

 of swarming. This one is given more 

 room if needed and passed by. 



With this system of handling the 

 swarming problem, it is necessary to 

 have some easy method of record to 

 keep an account of what has been done 

 from time to time in the yards. Book 

 records do not appeal to me, and for 

 that reason I use the following: 



I secure three wood pegs for each 

 hive. They are about 5 inches in 

 length, and are sharpened at one end. 

 As we kill the queens, if we find one 

 that we do not wish to kill, we stick 

 one, two or three pegs on the le/'t side 

 of the hive ; this means a laying queen. 

 One peg means a fair queen, two pegs 

 a good queen, and three pegs a choice 

 one. The last are usually used for 

 breeders if needed for that purpose. If 

 the queen is killed, one, two or three 

 are stuck ic/^/wrf the hive to designate 

 the standing of the queen killed. Ten 

 days later, at the time of cutting the 

 cells, leaving a grafted cell or one of 

 its own hive, one peg is stuck in the 

 ground at the ri^r/,/ of the hive, this 

 means a cell. A week or ten days 

 later they are examined for queen or 

 eggs. It only a queen is found, two 

 pegs are stuck at the n\f/il of the hive; 

 if eggs are found, three pegs appear. 

 These pegs remain in this position all 

 summer, and the record is marked on 

 the hive before they are removed to 

 winter quarters. This record is made 

 with pencil on side of the hives. By 

 these records a glance at the hives in 

 the yards enables me to tell the exact 

 condition of each hive at any time. 



A yard of 75 or 80 colonies can be 

 gone over by two men and a boy in a 

 day; that is, they will have ample time 

 to either kill queens or cut cells. 



I have been repeatedly asked how I 

 find the queens so fast. This is ac- 

 quired in almost the same manner as 

 one learns to play the piano or to op- 

 erate the typewriter. 1 can do neither 

 of the latter, but 1 think I do know 



how to find queens. It requires somei 

 natural ability, coupled with actual 

 practice along that line of work. It 

 would take too much time to go through' 

 all of the details of locating a queen 

 under the various conditions in which 

 they will be found. |) 



The next thing is to go over the 

 yards again in nine or ten days and cut 

 all the cells but one in each colony; 

 saving all of the choice cells from the 

 best breeding queens and destroying 

 all from the poorer stock. A number 

 of nuclei are started from the surplus 

 cells to supply any colony which may 

 fail or have a poor grade queen. 



Whenever a comb that carries a good 

 cell can be exchanged we do so ; other- 

 wise a cut-off cell is slightly pinched 

 between the combs just above some 

 brood, or pinned on with a small stick 

 or toothpick. Caution should be ex- 

 ercised at the time the queens are 

 killed, to see that there are no cells 

 left that might hatch before the cell- 

 cutting time. In other words, cut all 

 cells as well as kill the queens so that 

 all of the queens will be of the same 

 age. We also see that there is no un- 

 sealed brood in the hive at cell-cutting 

 time, as cells might be started and the 

 bees swarm when the grafted cell 

 hatches. 



After thoroughly going over a yard 

 in this VKay a man could not earn his 

 board h,f. ing swarms. I have not han- 

 dled swarms enough of late to keep in 

 practice. I have been asked how it 

 will work in the production of comb 

 honey to kill the queens in this way. 

 Why not ? There areas many bees for 

 the harvest as there would have been 

 had the old queen remained in the hive, 

 since it takes 21 days to rear a worker; 

 besides the brood is not there to re- 

 quire feeding for a part of this time, 

 and by the time the fall flow is on the 

 queen has gotten acquainted with egg 

 laying, and the colony goes into winter 

 quarters with a hive full of young bees. 

 Nothing else hindering, that means 

 good wintering, and good wintering 

 usually means a good crop. 



After the super combs get a good 

 start of honey in them, I try to go over 

 my yards and change the empties to 

 the middle, and those with honey in 

 them to the outside of the supers; this 

 makes uniform combs at extracting 

 time. At this round all the brood-nests 

 are examined for queens or eggs and 

 marked accordingly. 



A little about extracting and the ex- 

 tracting machinery and I am done. 

 When the honey is ripe and ready to 

 extract, I load my outfit of tanks and 

 4-frame automatic extractor (Root's 

 make), steam capping knife, and suffi- 

 cient 0-gallon cans to hold the daj's 

 work, about one ton. As the yards are 

 out or 8 miles, it is well toward 10 

 o'clock before we get there. Team off 

 and turned to pasture, the machinery is 

 taken inside the building, and in less 

 than h minutes all is set ready to run. 

 The honey is rushed into the honey- 

 house until nearly noon, when 50 to GO 

 supers of 9 to 10 frames are in the 

 house. The fire is started under the 

 capping-kiiife boiler, and while we eat 

 our dinners the capping knife is get- 

 ting hot. If it is too cold, and the 

 honey is too thick to strain well, a two- 

 wick oil-stove is set under the extractor. 



At 5 o'clock we start for home, and 

 while the man gets the team 1 rush the 

 lempty supers back on the hives. The 

 |5-gallon cans have been carried out 

 and loaded as fast as filled. The posi- 

 tion of the machinery in all the houses 

 f is the same. First, to the right of the 

 door, in the corner of the room, is the 

 extractor mounted on a low bench. A 

 two by four, about 12 feet long, is 

 shoved under a block and nailed to the 

 end wall of the house and sprung down 

 over the back of the extractor and 

 locked under a block and nailed to the 

 side wall. This holds the extractor 

 solid, and is all the fastening needed. 

 Five seconds will have it ready for use. 

 Next, to the left, is the comb box, 

 next the capping tub, the stove and 

 steam boiler, and across the back end 

 of the room are the honey and other 

 tanks. An electric bell, which is worth 

 its weight in gold, is used to tell us 

 when the 5-gallon can is full of honey. 

 This arrangement is simple, and is 

 made ready for use in 10 seconds. It 

 takes up scarcely any room in the 

 house or in the wagon. The trip ar- 

 rangement is a short board with a 

 piece of No. 9 wire fastened across it, 

 a short distance from one end; this is 

 used to act as a fulcrum, and a brick is 

 laid at the other end at a point that 

 will balance a can of honey when it is 

 almost full. When the can is almost 

 full it tilts down and makes the electric 

 connection, rings the bell for us to 

 either change the cans or shut off the 

 flow of honey. 



When the capping tub is full of cap- 

 pings, I beat them up fine and empty 

 them into a strainer cloth that is 

 spread over another coarsely woven 

 burlap cloth tied over the top of a can, 

 and allowed to bag down enough to 

 hold the tub of broken cappings. 

 When the capping tub is full again, the 

 four corners of the strainer cloth are 

 caught and the " wad " is dumped into 

 another can with a screen bottom. At 

 the end of each day's work this is 

 hauled home, and the next morning, 

 after drawing off the accumulated 

 honey at the bottom, it is dumped into 

 another tank in the storage house at 

 home and allowed to drain until it is 

 time to melt the wax. My home stor- 

 age house is a building 24x08, two 

 stories high, and in it I have a great 

 many contrivances that I would like to 

 show you, but time will not permit. 

 Colo, Iowa. 



I 



Propolisine 



BY .\. F. BONNEY. 



FOUND the attached article in a 

 paper: 



USE OF BEE-GLUE IN .-^URGERV. 



" Propolis, or bee-glue, is a waxy 

 or resinous substance collected by bees 

 from the buds of certain trees, and ap- 

 plied by them to the stopping of holes 

 and crevices in their hives, strengthen- 

 ing their cells, and to other purposes 

 in bee architecture where it may be 

 needed. 



"On distillation this material yields 

 an unctuous brownish liquid, to which 

 the name of propolisine has been given. 



"Propolisine has proven to be an 

 admirable varnish for wounds, cover- 



