106 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



answered by 

 Marengo, III. 



In this department will be answered those 

 questions needing immediate attention, and 

 such as are not of sufficient special interest to 

 require replies from the '20 or more apiarists 

 who help to make " Queries and Replies " so 

 interesting on another page. Tn the main, it 

 will contain questions and answers upon mat- 

 ters that particularly interest beginners.— Ed. 



Keeping Bees on Shares. 



Suppose I rent (or take) 20 colonies 

 of bees in the spring of the year, what 

 share ought I to have if I furnish the 

 hives for the new swarms, sections, etc.? 



Luce, Mich. W. C. 



Answer.— In this day of strikes I'm 

 not going to try to settle differences be- 

 tween labor and capital. As a rule, 

 working bees on shares is not a very 

 satisfactory thing, and there's danger of 

 dissatisfaction on both sides. As you 

 furnish all the labor and part of the 

 capital, the only thing the other man 

 should have is a good interest on the 

 value of the capital he furnishes, that 

 is the bees and hive they occupy. If I 

 were to make a guess in the premises, I 

 should say he would do pretty well if he 

 should get a fourth of the surplus honey 

 and increase. If the increase should be 

 a single swarm, it wouldn't be easy to 

 take a fourth of it, but part of the sur- 

 plus might bo traded for the share of 

 the swarm. 



Preventing Swarms— Pulled Queen. 



1. If I examine my bees every eight 

 days, and cut out queen-cells, can I pre- 

 vent swarming ? 



2. What are we to understand by a 

 " pulled queen ?" 



3. Please describe Mr. Hutchinson's 

 system of re-queening to prevent swarm- 

 ing? S. H. 



Prosser, Nebr. 



Answers. — 1. No, you can't rely on 

 it. Sometimes it will succeed and some- 

 times fail. 



2. It doesn't mean that she is taken 



by the leg or wing and pulled out of her 

 cell, as some have seemed to understand, 

 but that her cell has been pulled open, 

 allowing her to emerge sooner than she 

 would otherwise have done. When a 

 colony has sent out a prime swarm and 

 contemplates further swarming, a num- 

 ber of queens usually mature in the 

 hive, and about a week after the issuing 

 of the first swarm, if you put your ear 

 to the hive, especially in the still even- 

 ing, you will hear a young queen piping, 

 answered by one or more queens in a 

 coarser voice. The piping queen is at 

 large, and those that quahk are still in 

 their cells. These latter are, however, 

 mature queens, having a circle gnawed 

 in the capping of the cell, waiting for a 

 chance to come out. Take one of these 

 cells, pull off the capping and you have 

 a "pulled queen." 



3. I don't know that he has any pecul- 

 iar system. Each year he sends South 

 and gets young laying queens, putting 

 them in place of his older queens, and it 

 is well known that a queen of this year's 

 rearing is less likely to swarm than an 

 older one. 



Persimmon as a Honey- Yielder. 



Are persimmon blossoms good for 

 honey ? Father has 6 or 8 trees of 

 them, and the bees just swarm on them 

 most of the day. The blossoms come in 

 between the poplar and linden. 



Burkett, Ind. N. L. V. 



Answer.— I don't know anything 

 about the persimmon as a honey-yielder. 

 Perhaps some one can tell us about it. 

 But if the bees are busy on it, it is 

 pretty safe to say that it is a good 

 yielder, for bees are not likely to fool 

 away their time on blossoms that yield 

 no honey. 



Droneless Colony and Swarming. 



I have five colonies of bees in my 

 yard, all of them strong in bees, and one 

 of them very strong, but there are no 

 drones in the yard, nor have there been 

 any this season. Will they swarm while 

 they are in a droneless condition ? They 

 are doing fairly well, considering the 

 dry weather we are having, and the 

 strongest colony is at work in the super. 



Bees in neighboring apiaries that 

 have drones are killing them. A.S. 



Boone, Iowa, July 2. 



Answer. — You need not expect a 

 swarm from a colony that is killing 

 drones. If the killing is general, no 



