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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



J^ov. 12, 



partly filled with these same sections. I have always hereto- 

 fore taken them off ; however, I never had so many before, 

 we having no fall crop this season on account of a prolonged 

 drouth, and the bees have taken all the honey out of unfin- 

 ished sections and carried it below. Would you advise taking 

 all off, or leave them till spring and manipulate them just be- 

 fore the flow begins ? I am about on an air-line due east and 

 west, drawn from Savannah to Montgomery, Ala. Of course. 

 I winter my bees on the summer stands. When taking off 

 supers I simply put over the brood-chamber a piece of medium 

 paste-board, and the top board or cover on that, and my bees 

 come out all right in the spring. Some writers contend that 

 they winter better to have the super on. Which is best? 

 Smithville, Ga., Oct. 21. R. P. J. 



Answers. — 1. The comb of the unfinished sections will be 

 all right. The only question is about what is in the comb. If 

 they are partly filled at the time of taking off, and some or all 

 of the honey is left in them to be granulated, then perhaps the 

 best thing is to melt them up. Bat if, before any granulation 

 takes place, the bees have the opportunity to remove from 

 them the least and last trace of honey, whether they have 

 been previously extracted or not, then they will be all right to 

 use again. Possibly it might do to keep them till spring and 

 then let the bees clean them, but I don't know about that. I 

 would hardly want to trust to such sections being sufficiently 

 cleaned by putting them on or under a hive so that only the 

 bees of one colony could get at them. They must be open 

 plunder, so that there shall not be left the least particle, 

 for you understand it is the little granules left that have the 

 effect of starting all the contents of the section to granulating. 



2. Leaving the supers on with unfinished sections through 

 the winter may be all right for the bees, but it isn't all right 

 for the sections. Better get them off right away and give the 

 bees full sweep at them. If there are enough of them they 

 can be put out so that there will be no hindrance to any num- 

 ber of bees getting at each section, but if only a few are put 

 out in that way the bees will tear the combs. In that case 

 put three or four supers in a pile and allow an entrance for 

 only one bee at a time. 



Dequeening and Italianizing — House-Apiary 

 Cyprian Bees. 



1. We have read repeatedly of others getting a greater 

 surplus of comb honey by dequeening at the beginning of the 

 honey-flow, so we thought we would do likewise, and Italian- 

 ize our apiary at the same time. So at the beginning of the 

 honey-flow we killed off all the queens we wanted to super- 

 sede, and in five days we cut out all the cells they had started 

 and gave them cells from our Italian breeders ; they tore 

 every one of them down, and so we gave them more, and they 

 tore them down. Then we gave each a frame of eggs and 

 larvEe, and succeeded in getting them requeened, but they did 

 not store a bit of surplus, while the others that we did not 

 bother filled 3 or four supers each. What was the trouble ? 



2. We have a new bee-house about 300 feet from our api- 

 ary, where we wish to keep our bees permanently, summer 

 and winter. When will be the best time to move them, 

 with the least loss of bees ? and how close can they be placed 

 to each other with safety ? They will be four inches from the 

 ground, and the entrances all one way. 



3. What do you know of the Cyprian bees ? Would you 

 advise our trying them ? J. W. G. 



Gazelle, Calif. 



Answers. — 1. I confess I don't know enough to give a 

 very satisfactory answer. It very often happens that bees 

 tear down queen-cells that are given them, but I don't know 

 why. Sometimes the plan is followed of putting the cell right 

 in the place where one of their own has been cut out, and it is 

 said to favor success. A good plan is to put the queen-cell in 

 one of West's spiral cage.*. That leaves the end of the cell 

 free for the queen to emerge, but prevents the workers from 

 getting at the sides of the cells to gnaw them down. 



2. Probably your best time will be in winter for moving 

 your bees. If you could only know about such things before- 

 hand, the right time would be immediately after a flight at 

 the time when they will have the longest wait for the next 

 flight. If all are moved from the old place the danger of loss 

 will be much less than if some colonies remain at the old 

 place. For bees returning to the old stand and not finding 

 their own hive they will unite with one of the colonies near- 

 est their old home, whereas if no hives are there they are 

 more likely to return to the new place. It will be a good plan, 

 if you can, to make such changes in the old place as to make 



it look as unlike as possible. Another thing that will help, is 

 to put a board up before the entrance of the new hive for 

 some time. If a bee has some difficulty in getting out of its 

 hive, it is more likely to mark the location. For the same 

 reason, if the entrance is closed so as to prevent flight for 

 a time, the locality is more likely to be marked. 



The distance at which entrances can be placed with 

 safety from each other depends somewhat on circumstances. 

 The number of entrances has something to do with it. If a 

 hundred entrances are placed in a row, there's a good deal 

 more danger of mixing than if the number is reduced to three. 

 Much depends upon surrounding objects. If there are no 

 surrounding objects, 50 entrances all facing the same way 

 and at equal distances from each other would need to be five 

 or six feet apart, at the least. But if one or more trees are 

 near the entrances, they will be of the greatest use. Even a 

 a post or a board set up in front of the entrances will help. 

 Paint of different colors at the different entrances is said to be 

 effective. Having the entrances in pairs will allow you to 

 have the hives just half as far apart as if the entrances are at 

 equal distances. For the sake of economy of room, the hives 

 should be as close as they will stand, then have the entrances 

 in pairs and use posts or boards to help mark the entrance if 

 no trees or other objects are present. 



Possibly it may be well to explain what is meant by hav- 

 ing the entrances in pairs. Suppose the hives are 16 inches 

 apart from center to center, and the eutrances are four inches 

 long and two inches high. If each entrance is at the middle 

 of the hive, there will be a space of 12 inches between each 

 two entrances. Say the entrances face east. Now instead of 

 having the entrance of the hive at the north end at the middle 

 of the hive, let it be at the south part, and let the entrance of 

 the second hive be at the north part, the third at the south, 

 the fourth at the north, and so on. Now you will see that the 

 entrances of the first two will form a pair, those of the third 

 and fourth a pair, and so on. If there is a space of four 

 inches between the first and second entrances, then there will 

 be 20 Inches between the second and third entrances. A bee 

 that belongs to the south one of a pair of entrances will never 

 make the mistake of entering the north one. Even if there is 

 only one inch of space between them, if a little board is nailed 

 on in front so bees cannot readily crawl from one to the other, 

 there will be no trouble. 



3. The Cyprians are not at present in very great favor, 

 and you will do well to stick to the Italians till you have first 

 tried the Cyprians on a small scale. 



Unsealed Stores for Winter. 



I have been looking over my bees, and I find one colony of 

 Italians with the frames nearly all full of unsealed honey. I 

 have been giving them all the sugar they could use, and I am 

 doing the best I can to get the honey ripened. I put a box 

 over the hive to keep the heat up to help the bees to ripen 

 the honey. I am still feeding them with sugar, and will do so 

 as long as they can use it, or until I hear from you. It is one 

 of my pet colonies. J. 0. 



Gillespie, 111. 



Answer. — As a rule, sealed stores are better than un- 

 sealed. The sealing helps keep out the air and moisture, and 

 it is also an evidence that the contents of the cells are evap- 

 orated, for the bees do not generally seal the cells till the con- 

 tents are well ripened. But it sometimes happens that the 

 cells are sealed before the honey is fully evaporated, and in 

 other cases the sealing is delayed for some time after the con- 

 tents are ready to seal. So whether the bees will do as well 

 on unsealed honey depends upon the character of the honey. 

 Generally speaking, unsealed stores are not so good. 



If the bees have all the stores they need, the best thing to 

 help them to get them ripened is to stop feeding them more. 

 At this season it's uphill business to ripen stores, and they 

 ought not to be asked to do more of that sort of thing than is 

 absolutely necessary. 



m I w 



Timothy CliaflT for: Packing. 



How will timothy chaff do to pack around bees in chaff 

 hives ? It seems to me it would be first-class. E. J. P. 



Answer. — "After trying a great many kinds I have de- 

 cided in favor of soft wheat chaff," says A. I. Root in "A B C 

 of Bee-Culture." But if much more convenient to use timothy 

 chaff, you will probably find it to answer.quite well. 



