i8y6. 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



311 



but seem to be too warm. They are very strong and heavy, 

 and act some like swarming already. If I uncover the win- 

 dow the light is so much stronger than their little entrance, 

 that they fly to them, otherwise they do not fly about in the 

 house, and it is very nice to work about them, only a little too 

 dark. Do you think they will do all right this way ? If not, 

 how must I fix it to make it comfortable for both the bees and 

 myself? They are very good-natured so far. I supposed it 

 would be cooler inside when the sun did not strike the hives, 

 but they keep a good many bees in front buzzing for ventila- 

 lation ; seems to be too close and warm. C. O. 



Austin, 111. 



Answers. — 1. You can hardly go amiss in using those 

 combs. Perhaps as good a way as any will be to divide them 

 equally among the swarms. Count on a smaller number of 

 swarms than you think likely to come, and then if the swarms 

 don't come, you'll not have some of the combs left on your 

 hands unused. If more swarms come than you had expected, 

 it will be no harm to have the last ones without any of the 

 combs. It doesn't matter greatly in what part of the hive you 

 put thtm, only I'd put them together. 



The bees will take care of the pollen, but if any of the 

 combs are chiefly filled with pollen, and it is dry, hard and 

 moldy, you may save some work by soaking it up so it will be 

 soft. 



If the bees don't swarm too soon, you might do better not 

 to wait for swarms, but give the combs to old colonies, either 

 in a second story or by swapping for combs that are nearly 

 empty. It will be a little strange if you do not find some of 

 colonies that have combs that are nearly empty, and ready for 

 a swap. There is some danger that the combs on which the 

 bees died will become wormy — indeed, they are pretty sure to 

 become so. Keeping them in a cool place will delay the 

 worms, but there's nothing like having them in care of the 

 bees. A colony in a lO-frame hive, unless weak, can take 

 care of two stories of idle frames and be none the worse, but 

 rather the better for it. Put the idle combs under the colony 

 so the bees in passing in and out must travel over the empty 

 combs. When it comes to put on sections, of course the ex- 

 tra stories can be taken away, but by that time they'll be in 

 better condition for the swarms then if left unoccupied. 



2. Probably your bees will do all right. Why can't you 

 take the windows out entirely, so the air can pass through ? 

 That would make it cooler for you and the bees, and I don't 

 know that it would do any harm if the bees should prefer to 

 go in and out at the windows. Of course, it won't do to have 

 windows closed with glass and allow the bees the chance to 

 wear themselves out on the glass. 



If the bees are too warm, it would be a good plan to make 

 entrances larger. Instead of Kx5 inches, you could have 

 3x5, or 3x10. Possibly the entrance of the hive itself needs 

 enlarging. If the bees make trouble by flying around in the 

 shed, it ought not to be a great deal of trouble to make a 

 passage-way to each hive so the bees could not get out the 

 wrong way. 



M I m 



Introducing by Trans rcrring Frame ivilli Qncen, 

 Bees and All. 



I want to know whether it is safe to introduce (or try to) 

 % queen by taking the frame she is on from one hive and in- 

 troduce it (queen and all) into the queenless hive ? If it will 

 work, I want to follow this practice : 



Colony No. 1 has a very fine, prolific queen, and as I am 

 intending dividing this spring to a considerable extent, I want 

 the queens to come from this queen. Now, I contemplate 

 making colony No. 2 queenless, and then take the frame 

 upon which the queen is situated from colony No. 1 and in- 

 sert it, queen and clustering bees, into No. 2. No. 1 will 

 then build queen-cells, which I will cut out in about a week, 

 and insert into divided colonies, and then take the queen from 

 No. 2, on the frame as before, and place her with frame and 

 clustering bees again in No. 1. This process I will repeat 

 every week, or such a matter, until I have all my colonies 

 supplied ? 



What do you think of the plan ? What effect will it have 

 on the honey-producing of No. 1 and No. 2, which I will not 

 divide ? Will it not have the same effect as caging the queen, 

 that some advocate ? G. W. C. J. 



Wichita, Kan. 



Answer. — As a rule you will find a queen accepted in a 

 queenless colony if taken with a frame of brood and bees 

 from her own colony, especially in the honey season. But on 

 the whole, I'm not sure you will like the contemplated plan. 

 When you put such queen in a strong colony, and queen-cells 



are present, the bees may take a notion to swarm. You may 

 think there are no queen-cells left, but it's a very hard thing 

 to make sure that you've missed no cells. Not so very hard 

 to find the cells after a colony has swarmed naturally, but it's 

 a very difl'erent thing when the queen has been taken away 

 and the bees have constructed after-cells. They'll be hidden 

 in all sorts of places, and sometimes you'll look riaht on the 

 middle of a comb and hardly detect it, for it will project very 

 little from the surface. And If a queen-cell is left and the 

 bees don't swarm, there is a chance tliat the young queen may 

 be allowed to kill the old one. After all, you may like the 

 plan better than I think. 



Suffering from Bcc-Paraly»i$. 



What is the matter with my bees? A strong, prime 

 swarm from last spring, with a prolific queen this spring up to 

 date are at war among themselves. 



Why, or from what cause, do bees continually wiggle on 

 the alighting-board ? Why are some bees hatched out by the 

 above colony, long, black and shining, abdomens slender, and 

 no hair ovl them ? They are young bees, and seem to be 

 afraid of the other bees. It is good for them to be, too, be- 

 cause they are killed daily. 



Honey is coming in fast from white clover. 



Monroe, La., April 25. H. R. 



Answer. — From your description your bees have bee- 

 paralysis. In the North it never seems to amount to much, 

 but in the South it becomes very destructive. The worst of it 

 is that there seems so far to be no cure known. True, a good 

 many cures have been given, changing the queen, giving salt, 

 etc., but whenever a cure is given the very next one that tries 

 it reports it a failure. About the only comfort I can give you 

 is the cold comfort of saying to you to wait patiently in hopes 

 the disease will run its course in a short time. 



Selling Honey Direct, Without Soliciting or Peddling. 



Some years ago, when I began to produce honey by the 

 ton, 1 relinquished the home market, leaving it to small pro- 

 ducers, although I have still a considerable local demand. I 

 have not offered a pound of honey to any one in this town of 

 8000 inhabitants for over 10 years, and I have never since 

 been able to meet the demand without purchasing from others. 

 How have I found my customers ? you may ask. This is how: 



I took up " Bradstreet's Report," and turned to Manitoba 

 and the Canadian Northwest. In every city, town, and village 

 I selected and listed the names of grocers, druggists, and 

 fruit-dealers, taking great care to enter the names of none 

 but those who were rated " good." To each of these I mailed 

 a price-list (one of which I inclose, which you will notice is da- 

 ted seven years ago, and is the last I needed to send out.) 

 From that day to the present I have not had to seek a cus- 

 tomer. — R. McKnight, in Gleanings. 



Poultry and Bees. 



I see in an article by Mr. Ashley that he combines poultry 

 with bees. That is .just what I have been doing. In fact, I 

 think that, without the poultry, I should give up bees. That 

 large nursery I have told you about, with it I hatch chickens 

 in the winter and queens in the summer ; so you see it is no 

 dead property. The chickens (or chicks, rather), when taken 

 from the incubator, are transferred to a brooder-house 20x60, 

 which is heated by hot- water pipes under the brooder, where 

 the little chicks go to get warm. The temperature is kept at 

 from 95° to 100- ; and, in fact, tbese chicks do not get out- 

 side of the building until ready for market, which is when 

 they weigh about 1 '..< to 2 pounds each, when they are shipped 

 to Chicago, where they command a ready sale until the middle 

 of June, when they are shipped east instead of west. — H. G. 

 QuiRiN, in Gleanings. 



Just Call It "Honey." 



Many people have been led to put up their honey in bot- 

 tles marked "Extracted." Now, if such would only inquire 

 among their city friends they would find out that "strained " 

 is what people want. The " extracted " suggests machinery 

 When 1 bought my "Cowan" I found a strainer attached to 

 the machine. What was it for, Mr. Editor ? On a close in- 

 quiry you will find that lots of people " like the good old 

 strained honey." My advice is to put neither " strained " nor 

 "extracted" on your packages. Sell it for honey. — W. K. 

 Morrison, in Gleanings. 



See "Bee-Keeper's Guide" offer on page 318. 



