American T^ee Journal 



April, 1914. 



)^— '^^I^^B' J 



Dr. MillerIs 



Answers^ 



Send Questions either to the office of the American Bee Journal or direct to 



Dr. C. C. Mii.i.ER. Marengo. III. 



He does not answer bee-keeping questions by mail. 



Best Metnod of Increase 



As I am only 25 miles from you. please rec" 

 ommend the best method of iinrcjsc and still 

 get a crop of honey for our locality. Have 

 your " Forty Years Among the Bees." 



Illinois. 



Answer.— There are so many different 

 circumstances and conditions that it is not 

 easy to say what one system is best. What 

 is best one time may not be best another. In 

 the book you mention the matter of increase 

 is discussed as fully, at least, as in any book 

 I know of. After a careful study of what 

 you find there, you will be able to decide for 

 yourself better than I could decide for you. 

 If, however. I were obliged to confine myself 

 to any one plan, with the idea of interfering 

 little with the honey crop. I think it would 

 be the nucleus plan. With that you can 

 make much or little increase, and you need 

 not draw from one colony enough to hinder 

 it from doing fair work in supers. But if by 

 " still get a crop of honey " you mean to get 

 as much as if you got no increase, I don't be- 

 lieve you can make it in your location. That 

 only happens where there is an important 

 fall flow, 



Large Hives in Winter 



Some beekeepers advocate taking out 

 the two outside frames in an 8-frame hive 

 and putting in their place chaff-filled dum- 

 mies for wintering. Now that leaves only 

 six frames in the hive for the colony to win- 

 ter on. You advocate a very much larger 

 hive, and some eo so far as to advocate a 17- 

 framehive. What do you do with all the 

 large space in your hive in the winter; or, 

 in other words, what would you do with it if 

 you wintered your bees on the summer 

 stands ? . , , 



2, How can I manage with my o-frame 

 hives and give them plenty of stores for 

 winter and spring and yet have room for 

 two chaff dummies at the outside ? 



3, Would you use these dummies or would 

 you use two frames of sealed honey in their 

 stead ? Nebraska. 



Answers.— I. We rarely reduce our hive 

 n the winter. However, with our large 

 hives, dummies may be put on each side of 

 the frames leaving an ample supply. 



2 and 3, With hives of the size you men- 

 tion, we would put the sheltering dummies 

 on the outside. In other words, we would 

 leave in the hive all their frames, if filled 

 with honey, and we would place windbreaks 

 or packing of some kind on the cold sides, 

 leaving the front or south side exposed. 

 This method which has given us satisfaction 

 may not be suitable for damp countries or 

 for countries much farther north. Each 

 climate requires methods adapted to it. 



Bee-Escapes^Best Bees— Splints, Etc. 



1. I run my bees for extracted honey. 

 How can I free the supers of bees without 

 liaving to brush every comb? I do not care 

 to use the Porter bee escape board if there 

 is any other way. 



2. In making a few special crosses can 1 

 not lake a colony with special drones, also 

 the nuclei with virgin queens late in the 

 evening and pat them in a dark cellar, keep- 

 ing them there until all drones have stopped 

 flying on the following day, and then bring 

 my colony of special drones and nuclei out 

 for a flight, repeating this several limes if 

 necessary ? Will this plan work ? 



\ What plan do you use in rearing queens 

 at the present ? 



4. What race of bees will gather the most 

 honey regardless of faults ? 



5. Can I put frames with full sheets of 

 foundation between two combs and get good 

 worker combs that are not stretched too 

 much at the top; I mean without wiring? 



6. Is there any danger of getting too much 

 water in the honey when uncapping knives 

 are kept in boiling water, using first one 

 knife and then another? 



7. Do you know of any two beekeepers 

 who think exactly the same about anyone 

 subject concerning bees? 



8. Would you consider a location where 

 bees start to swarming the last of April and 

 continue until about the middle of July a 

 bad location? Virginia. 



Answers.— I. You could use some other 

 escape, as the Miller tent-escape. It con- 

 sists of a robber-cloth with a cone of wire- 

 cloth centrally located. 



2 Yes, this plan has been in use for a good 

 many years, yet it is not very generally fol- 

 lowed if I am not mistaken. You should feed 

 the bees when you set them out, so as to 

 start them to flying. 



3. The same I have used for years, as given 

 in "Fifty Years Among the Bees" and in 

 previous numbers of this journal. The col- 

 ony with the best queen is allowed to build 

 comb, the queen laying in this virgin comb, 

 which is then given to a queenless colony. 



4. Probably none will exceed the Italians, 

 although others may do as well, and with 

 the right kind of care and selection hybrids 

 may do as well as pure stock. 



5. You may by using foundation splints or 

 very heavy foundation. Even then you will 

 not always get the best results between two 

 drawn-out combs, for too often these combs 

 will be bulged into the comb between them. 



6. Practically no danger, 



7. Yes, lots of them. But I am not sure I 

 know any two beekeepers that think alike 

 on <z//subjects concerning beekeeping. 



8. It might be bad and it might be good. 



Miscellaneous Questions 



1. I have at present 8 colonies of bees, and 

 I do no not know whether they are blacks, 

 hybrids, or just what they are, but they 

 seem to be rather disinclined to work and 

 over anxious to swarm. Last year from 

 the 4 orignal colonies I secured 11 swarms. I 

 would like to requeen some of them with 

 Italian queens and see if this will not make 

 them better honey gatherers and more gen- 

 tle. I did not get any surplus last year, and 

 what little honeT was stored in the supers I 

 did not remove, as I thought they would 

 need that to help tide them over the winter. 

 As it has been a rather severe winter for us, 

 I think I did right 



2. About what time should the new queens 

 be introduced ? 



1. Would you recommend the 3 or the s 

 banded Italians ? 



4. Do you think any other race of bees 

 would be more suited to this part of the 

 country than Italians? . , , ^ ■ 



S Please give me the metnod 01 fixing 

 foundation (full sheets) in frames with wires. 

 Also starters, say 5 or 6 inches deep. 



Kansas. 



Answers.— I. I am wondering whether you 

 had last year one or several good bee books 

 and had become familiar with their con- 

 tents. If you had. you hardly would have 

 allowed II swarms to issue from 4 colonies. 

 Anil the difference in results might have 



paid for a number of boo Us. Hew ever io 

 a bee journalmaybe.it is only supplemen- 

 tary to the teachings of a text book. You 

 could easily have kept the number of 

 swarms down to 4 in all probability. When 

 the prime swarm issues, hive it and set it in 

 place of the mother, setting the mother 

 close beside the swarm. A week later set 

 the mother 10 feet away or farther. That's 

 all. 



2. The best time was last fall. But since 

 you didn't it is not best to wait until next 

 fall. You can do it in fruit bloom. But it 

 will probably be better to wait 2, 3, or more 

 weeks longer, when the main flow is on. 



3. There are 3-banders better than the 

 majority of s-banders. Also, there are 5- 

 banders better than the majority of 3-band- 

 ders. On the average you are likely safer 

 with the 3-banders. 



4. Very doubtful. 



5 To give very full directions hardly 

 comes in the scope of this department, but 

 if you don't happen to find it in a book I may 

 say briefly that if you have top-bars with 

 kerf and wedge, it will be easy to insert the 

 upper edge ofthesheetinthe kerf. and then 

 push in the wedge ./<r/>. Then one of the 

 ways of fastening the wire in the foundation 

 is with the spur wheel, during the work in a 

 very warm room, so the foundation will be 

 soft. If you have no kerf in top-bar. then 

 run melted wax along the joint between the 

 foundation and top-bar. 



I don't want to tell how to put in 5-inch 

 starters, because I don't want to use them. 

 No economy in it. You will have entirely 

 too much drone comb. " You're going to put 

 them in anyhow?" Oh, all right, then. Put 

 them in exactly the same as full sheets. 



Stimulative Feeding 



1, I want to have my bees strong enough at 

 the beginning of clover bloom iwhich begins 

 here about June 5 to 10: to fill two lo-frame 

 dovetailed bodies. My bees will have plenty 

 of good sealed white honey. Can I gain any- 

 thing by feeding sugar syrup ? 



2. If so. what proportion of water would 

 you recommend to the suear ? 



Wisconsin, 

 Answers —I. I believe good honey is bet- 

 ter food for bees than sugar syrup. Hence, 

 other things being equal, to get them to take 

 sugar in place of honey would be a damage. 

 There are places where there is such a 

 dearth between fruit bloom and honey that 

 brood-rearing ceases entiiely, even with 

 abundance of honey in the hive. In such a 

 place it pays to feed enough to keep up 

 brood-rearing. Even then, it is better to 

 feed honey than sugar, or to scratch or un- 

 cap the combs of sealed honey. But I don't 

 believe you have that kindof place in your 

 part of Wisconsin. It there is abundance 

 of honey in the hive, and it there is as much 

 brood in the hive as the bees can cover, 

 what can you possibly gain by feeding ? 



2 If the bees should run short of stores 

 early in the season, and for lack of good 

 honey you should be obliged to feed sugar 

 syrup, use equal parts of sugar and water, 

 either by weight or measure. 



Foul Brood? — Probably Starvation 



I have 16 colonies of bees; had 20 last 

 spring, but on account of late frost killing 

 the early flowers, they did not begin rearing 

 brood until very late in the spring, and the 

 honey flow was almost a complete failure. 

 In August something went wrong with the 

 brood in nearly all of my colonies; probably 

 it was foul brood. The brood would do fine 

 and seem to be getting along all right until 

 just a few days before hatching when the 

 bees would begin carrying it out. Almost all 

 of the brood would still be alive when car- 

 ried out. It could not haycbeen American 



