276 



Gleanings in Bee Culture 



One colony increased to an apiary of thirty limine l!i|ii, the liees Ijuililint: all tin- cmubs irom half-inch 

 starters. 



least that has been my experience. Bees 

 build up faster in the spring in these frames, 

 as the hives are more compact. 



I use two sizes of hives, both of them of 

 my own design — one an eight-frame hive 

 which I use when running for increase, for 

 shipping, and for wintering. The other, a 

 sixteen-frame, is nearly 25 inches long, out- 

 side measure, and is used only for the pro- 

 duction of comb or extracted honey. This 

 I call my non-swarming hive, and I never 

 had a colony swarm when the hive was 

 tiered up three stories high, and only one 

 swarm in 25 years, that I know of, when it 

 was tiered two stories high. I make all my 

 hives with a half-inch space above and be- 

 low the frames excepting the brood cham- 

 bers, which have a little more than an inch 

 space below the bottom-bars. 



Mr. Fort used nothing but half-inch start- 

 ers in the brood frames, the bees building 

 all their own combs except the starters. 

 This queen was one of the best layers I ever 

 saw. On May 29 I went to his place and 

 examined the colony, and found seven full 

 combs of brood and one comb full of honey. 

 I took two combs of brood nearest ready to 

 hatch, and the comb of honey, with jolenty 

 of bees on all three, and the queen, and put 

 them in an empty hive quite a distance 

 away. I shook the bees from two more 

 combs from the old hive into the new one, 

 knowing that many of the bees in the hive 

 just made would return to the old location. 

 I then placed five new frames with starters 

 in the new hive and three new frames in 

 the old queenless hive. 



One week from this time I made two 

 more small colonies from the queenless 

 part, giving each part two nice queen cells. 

 Of course the old hive with the one comb of 

 brood was fully as strong as any, as most of 

 the field workers were there. Note that the 

 queen cells were all started where the field 

 bees were. There were none in the new 

 hive with the queen. 



Mr. Fort painted some of his hives green, 

 some white, and some red. Fvery young 

 queen mated safely this time, and the four 

 colonies were soon strong. 



On June 26 the hive where the old queen 

 was located was packed full again. 1 then 

 divided in the same way I did before, and 

 one week later two more were made. 



On July 24 the hive containing the old 

 queen was full once more, and I divided it 

 that day; also quite a number of the old 

 hives; and one week from that time many 

 more were made. We had now come to a 

 point where we could go fast, and the yard 

 was soon full. 



On August 2S we divided for the last time. 



A large swarm lor August. 



