1896. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



115 



during fruit-bloom. By having the queens clipped, five min- 

 utes is ample time to attend to each colony, as the swarms will 

 return of their own accord, that is, early or prime swarmf:. It 

 is possible that under this management a second issue of the 

 swarm may take place, but not more frequently than will be 

 the case of swarms leaving the hive under usual methods. 



Before I give the method, allow me to say here, that I am 

 convinced that bees allowed to swarm can be so managed as 

 to have section comb built out faster than would be done in a 

 colony in a placid or normal condition ; because, under the 

 excitement of swarming, wax-scales are secreted more abun- 

 dantly than under any other couditious, as instinct or reason 

 causes the bees to secrete wax to be used in building up a 

 future home, and these conditions can be used by the apiarist 

 to greatly facilitate comb-building in the sections. This state- 

 ment does not so much concern those who extract as those 

 who produce comb honey only. -It is for the latter class that 

 this is written. 



Whenever your bees swarm secure the queen. Screen- 

 wire wound around a round piece of wood or corn-cob is about 

 the most convenient, both for lightness, size, etc., as also a 

 piece can be used as a stopper. A 4-inch square piece of 

 screen-wire from the edge of the web is safest, as no raveled 

 ends are in the way to pierce the queen. 



Lay the queen in this cage on the bottom-board in front 

 of the hive from which the swarm issued ; open the hive and 

 remove all combs on which are closed cells ; bruise all others, 

 place the combs with cells in the rear of the hive, or in a 

 comb-box with adhering bees ; push together the remaining 

 combs, fill the empty space outside of the division-board with 

 any material most handy. Close the hive, returning the 

 supers if on, or put on sections. The swarm returns ; release 

 the queen, and the conditions are most favorable for comb- 

 building and honey depositing. No honey to be wasted in 

 building comb in the brood-nest, and as honey, pollen and 

 brood fills the hive, all work will be thrown into the sections. 



The frames taken out can be put into nucleus hives, or, if 

 you have none, put them into any hive partitioned off to re- 

 ceive them. New frames can be given these as they need 

 them. You can make new colonies with them, or unite when 

 the honey-flow ceases. In uniting, cover the hive you wish to 

 preserve with screen-wire, and set the other on above this; in 

 a day or two unite — harmony all around. 



This method will yield you more honey than to throw the 

 bees into a condition where they waste their opportunity of 

 securing a large surplus by building for themselves new 

 brood-combs, as in a short honey-flow work is divided between 

 the brood-nest and the sections, and is too short to finish 

 either. 



I hope this will answer Dr. Miller's criticism found on 

 page 682 (1895). 



On page 58o (1895) Adrian Getaz writes : "If I could 

 prevent swarming and keep up brood-rearing, and thereby the 

 strength of the colony during the honey-flow, I should get con- 

 siderable surplus." 



On page 545, J. E. Taylor says: "I knew one strong 

 colony was worth two weak ones. I moved hive No. 1 within 

 a foot of No. 2, then moved No. 2 away about 20 feet, and 

 taking each frame I shook off the bees on the alighting-board 

 of No. 1, smoked them, and they entered ; also returning bees 

 from both colonies. Before finishing the job, a swarm issued 

 from another hive ; I hived them in No. 2, and filled with 

 brood-combs (brood and honey); result, a large surplus from 

 No. 2." 



On page 526, R. V. Sauer writes : " I work my bees two, 

 three, and even four stories high, trying to keep them from 

 swarming as much as possible, and only hive such swarms as 

 settle together while swarming, or such as I do not know from 

 which hive they came. All other single swarms I put back 

 from whence they came." 



Also see an article on page 648 (1895), from Eugene 

 Secor, which is too long to copy. 



On page 573 (1895), is a quotation from the American 

 Bee-Keeper, from the pen of_ G. M. Doolittle, viz.: "I have 

 been a careful observer for 25 years, and find that when bees 

 are at work best in the sections there is little honey in the 

 brood-chamber during the white honey harvest. It would be 

 a doubtful expedient to use the extractor on combs below, if 

 one expects to secure a large yield of comb honey. If honey 

 accumulates in the combs before the bees are fairly started in 

 the sections, have no fears the bees will carry it up and make 

 room for the queen." 



On page 576 (1895) E. Tarr writes that as he has bees 

 enough he hives two or three swarms together and gets large 

 yields. 



On page 890 of Gleanings, from the top down 20 lines, 

 therein is written : "It is almost impossible to get eueii rea- 



sonable work in sections with a colony that has not swarmed, 

 while the one that swarms will do almost nothing in the sec- 

 tion." — R. C. Aiken, Loveland, Colo. Why, the mother colony 

 is deciminated in bees, and swarming accelerates their 

 activity. 



I think I have supported this question by sufficient quota- 

 tions to bolster it on all sides — that if no swarming takes 

 place honey is more surely stored ; that swarming is condu- 

 cive to increased activity ; that swarms returned to the 

 mother colony give large yields ; and the fact of being so 

 much less trouble in taking care of the bees, as one can care 

 for several swarms in the air iu less time than one caught in 

 a swarming box or basket. 



Eight days of actual gathering during basswood bloom, 

 and two days of rain with no work done, bees treated as above, 

 and also the prevailing methods, the bees that returned gave 

 over two supers of 24 1%-inch sections filled, and not a com- 

 pleted section in the others. Our fall flow was nothing- 

 plenty of bloom, but no nectar. As one can build up during 

 fruit-bloom by putting surplus hives on the brood-nest, and 

 strengthen the colony, it is not necessary to combine colonies, 

 making them as strong as an 8-frame hive can contain ; and 

 when the time arrives for honey-secretion from whatever 

 source it is to be obtained, place the surplus case over the 

 super with an escape over the super, and in the morning the 

 super can be taken off minus the bees. You then have the 

 combs to supply nuclei, if they should requre it, until a later 

 flow comes, and the hatched brood is old enough to go to the 

 field. Des Moines, Iowa. 



Nectar and Its Secretion. 



BV W. H. MORSE. 



What is nectar, and what are the conditions necessary to 

 a copious supply of it ? 



In the first place I want to say that the previous year has 

 very little to do with supplying the nectar for the year follow- 

 ing. (I can hear scores say that won't do, but it is a fact, 

 nevertheless.) Let us take, for instance, a small apple-tree in 

 the first year of its existence, and upon careful investigation 

 we shall find that as the sap rises in the spring in this small 

 tree, and, in fact, all trees, it is little more than water im- 

 pregnated with a small amount of fertilizer held in solution by 

 the surrounding moisture, but when it rises in the spring, and 

 reaches the leaf buds and unfolds them, then the laboratory 

 work begins, the sun's rays of light act on the wonderful or- 

 ganism of the leaf, and the young plant begins to receive 

 from them the prepared sap which goes to build up the plant 

 in general, and stores sufficient chemically-prepared tissue to 

 mature its buds for next year ; and so it goes on till it ac- 

 quires sufficient age to make the peculiar fermentation neces- 

 sary to produce fruit-buds, and the little parts of the flower 

 are in an embryo state, lying dormant through the winter, but 

 as soring advances the flowers open up, and then the labora- 

 tory work is so wonderful — all man's achievements seem puny 

 in the contemplation of this little flower. The sun's rays of 

 light are the great agent in the work. If any one doubts it, 

 put a red-flowering plant in total darkness as soon as its 

 flower-buds can be seen, and give it heat and water, and its 

 flowers and leaves will be white, or almost so. So we see that 

 the sun is the base of the work, marking the petals with such 

 beautiful tints of color, and forming the essential oils which 

 give the flower its perfume, and adds vigor to the pistil and 

 stamens, and to the nectary, which is the part of the flower 

 that is of interest to us as bee-keepers. 



Now, I have tried to give the preceding to back up the 

 statement I made, that the preceding year has nothing to do 

 with filling this nectary with nectar. True, it builds it in 

 embryo, but does nothing more. No, friends, it is when the 

 atmosphere is favorable that plant life seems to take on that 

 excessively luxurious growth that delights all lovers of Na- 

 ture, that the flowers are changing the sap into nectar, de- 

 positing it into the nectary by such wonderful process that 

 man cannot imitate it even if he had thousands of years to 

 try. In fact, it would be almost like getting a strawberry 

 from a rosebush, or i'ice verso. I used to think it possible to 

 work that way, but iu actual practice I struck snags on all 

 sides, and had to give it up. 



But some plants have the power of producing nectar un- 

 der unfavorable circumstances, such as sweet clover and 

 many others. Then there are plants which it seems take 

 spells and produce an excessive amount of nectar one year, 

 and not any for several years following — tropical plants grown 

 in greenhouses are especially so. I remember a peculiar case 

 of this kind; it was with a plant named "Hoyacarnosa." It 



