May 24, 1900. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



325 



nightcap, rubs the cobwebs from his eyes, eats his break- 

 fast of flapjacks and honey, ami sallies forth to meet llic 

 rising sun and the expanding ncctar-laden flowers down by 

 the riverside. This is the industrious little bee that wo 

 heard so much of during our cliildhood years — our parents 

 told us of this little morsel of the insect world when they 

 wisht to impress upon us ways of usefulness and neatness, 

 and teachers sermonized to us about him and the ant — how 

 industrious they were, and what lessons we should learn 

 from them. For the present I shall pass this bee by as not 

 being the one I am after. Your old bee is behind the times 

 forme; mine is trained to a diflerent manner of life. I 

 will state that he is no spring chicken, which may seem 

 strange, since I have held out to you that he is an early bee. 



This bee of mine has become hardened by the frosts of 

 winter ; he has learned to wear an overcoat, and at the first 

 approach of spring he discards the garment and hies him- 

 self to the flower-fields, there to gather in the nectar in a 

 way that makes the bee-man's heart rejoice. No wonder 

 you are already proclaiming him a most wonderful honey- 

 producer. I feel that there is not a bee-keeper in this glori- 

 ous country of ours but wants this remarkable little worker. 

 My friends, he shall be yours, if you only do as I have done 

 to get him. In finding him I was necessarily under much 

 expense and trouble, but never mind, I have found him, 

 and will charge you nothing for my labor. I shall feel well 

 repaid if you have the same success with him as I have had. 



As you must be impatient by this time to know all 

 about this early bee, I shall hurry to tell you all about him. 



My bee is one that does not require a warehouse full of 

 provisions to supply his kitchen during the days that are 

 dark, and cold, and dreary — those days when good nitrog- 

 enous food is required by man and beast to put an extra 

 coat of fat where it will do the most good to ward ofl:' cold. 

 We know that an old animal is more susceptible to cold 

 than a young animal ; that the latter does not require so 

 much fat-producing food as the other ; neither is he so likely 

 to hug the fire of a cold day, tho he may have to put on a 

 warm overcoat to keep the cold out. Now, the bee I have 

 for wintering is the very youngest bee I can get. He is 

 padded with fat, and walketh like an alderman. 



We know that no matter how well filled a hive of bees 

 may be in the fall, it won't have near so many occupants 

 at the approach of winter. To some extent this is a wise 

 provision of Nature, as there are less bees to feed. 



Where I have managed bees for so many years I find 

 that it is wise to leave the colonies to their own sweet will 

 after the first week in July. It is after this time that the 

 queen ceases to lay as many eggs as she did during the 

 forepart of the year. The population of the hives is daily 

 diminishing, so that by the beginning of winter, as I have 

 intimated, the colony will be much reduced in number. 

 Now, I do not want my colonies to dwindle down to a hatful 

 of bees. I want good, strong colonies to take thru the win- 

 ter, even if they will consume a goodly supply of honey. 

 And I do not want a lot of old bees for this purpose, either. 

 The latter are not likely to hold out thru the winter, many 

 of them will die during those balmy winter days we are 

 wont to have in this climate, for bees will venture out every 

 time the sun casts his beaming countenance on a gladsome 

 earth. Too oft are such days but traps to catch the un- 

 wary bee ; with merry hum he flies forth, but ere he has 

 time to return a fatal change may take place and dash the 

 busy worker to an untimely grave. A young bee is more 

 apt to withstand such hardship, but not so the bee of last 

 year. 



To get this early and young bee I proceed in late Octo- 

 ber, after the colony and the queen have had sufficient rest, 

 to arrange the supers with feeders so as to coax the queen 

 to renewed egg-laying by stimulative feeding. The feeders 

 allow but a limited quantity of liquid to flow, as it is only 

 desirable to build up gently. By this plan I have had a 

 queen fill the brood-chamber with bees by Christmas, after 

 which time I cea.st to provide further feed. And by this 

 time, too, the hive was well provisioned with stores, so that 

 in some instances it was necessary to remove a few combs 

 of honey, which, at this period of the year, are serviceable 

 in assisting destitute colonies to " keep the wolf from the 

 door," if I may be allowed to use the expression. 



After the queen has been the means of producing such 

 a large stock of young bees at a season when nature in- 

 tended that she should take a rest from her maternal duties, 

 it is well to remove her to a hive where she will not be called 

 upon to do much egg-laying until spring is well under way. 

 In her place introduce a young queen of known prolificness 

 that has.notjyet^been called upon to propagate her species 



out of sea.son. Your hive is now ready to begin its spring 

 campaign in a most wonderful way, as you will find out if 

 you give this method a trial. The colony will be strong 

 and vigorous, and by the middle of February, if not before, 

 it will be in a condition to swarm, but this is not yet desired. 

 If it is too strong, and there is evidences of its swarming, 

 you might take some of the combs with adhering bees and 

 give them to a weak colony, say the one you placed the 

 mother of your " early bees " with. 



I do not know of a better way of having populous colo- 

 nies at the earliest date possible than by the plan just out- 

 lined. It gives you strong colonies for winter, and as the 

 inmates, with few exceptions, are young bees, they live well 

 into spring. For the apiarist who desires to build up by 

 division this is a capital plan, at least I have found it so. 

 He is given the material at the very opening of spring, and 

 by judicious manipulation he may increase two-fold and 

 have a good working-force when the main honey crop 

 arrives. 



Now, my friends, I have told you what I know about the 

 early bee, tho it took me some time to do so— perhaps I 

 should have taken a bee-line and have gotten at my object 

 sooner. I hope my subject and its treatment has not dis- 

 appointed you. You may have expected something better. 

 I feel confident that after you have given the method a 

 thoro trial you will exclaim, as I did after discovering it, 

 "Eureka!" Pray do not let me hear that any of you were 

 " onto " this trick long ago, as that would be a sad disap- 

 pointment to me, and blast my hopes of being considered 

 one of the great lights in the galaxy of apicultural giants. 

 My place along with Langstroth, Huber, Dzierzon and 

 other big guns would be " knockt into a cockt hat." 



Thanking you, my friends, for allowing me to tire you 

 with the foregoing remarks, wise and otherwise, and ask- 

 ing your pardon for having repeatedly referred to your lit- 

 tle pets as belonging to the masculine gender, when, I be- 

 lieve, most of you hold that I should have called the worker- 

 bee an " it " or a " she ;" and promising not to disturb your 

 equanimity further during this meeting, I beg to subscribe 

 myself— Yours for the Early Bbe. 



Alameda Co., Calif. 



Essential Points in Rearing- Good Queens. 



BY J. P. MOORE. 



TO rear good queens, equal to those reared under the 

 swarming-impulse, three essential points must be ob- 

 served, viz.: 



1st. They must be reared from small larva;. Those 12 

 to 24 hours old are just right for the purpose. If bees are 

 given larva; of all ages from which to rear queens, some of 

 the queens will be almost worthless. Doolittle puts the 

 limit at 36 hours, but, to be on the safe side, I would advise 

 the use of larvse not more than 24 hours old ; for no queen- 

 breeder will say that the former are better than the latter. 



2d. The queen-cells must be built in full colonies well 

 supplied with young bees. The young bees do the nursing ; 

 therefore, it is necessary to have plenty of young bees to 

 feed the embryo queens a large quantity of the royal food, 

 that strong, well-developt queens may be produced. 



3d. They must be either reared during a good honey- 

 flow, or in the absence of this, liberal feeding must be prac- 

 ticed. 



This is highly important, and is the only way in which 

 we can rear good queens after the honey season is over. 



During my 20 years' experience in queen-rearing I have 

 tried every method which has been brought to public notice, 

 and I consider Doolittle's method far superior to all others. 

 This method combines the essential points mentioned above 

 in the highest degree. By it we are enabled to have queen- 

 cells built in the upper story of any colony devoted to the 

 production of extracted honey, having a queen-excluding 

 honey-board between the upper story and brood-chamber. 

 Remove two frames from the upper story of such a colony, 

 and in their place put two frames of unsealed brood. The 

 object in doing this is to draw a large force of nurse-bees 

 above to attend to the queen-cells. Two days later remove 

 another frame from the upper story, spread the two frames 

 of brood apart, and place a prepared frame between them. 

 By " prepared frame " is meant a frame containing a num- 

 ber of queen-cell cups, each supplied with a little royal jelly 

 and a larva about one day old. About IS cells are as many 

 as a colony should be allowed to build at one time. 



To describe the manner of making the cell-cups and 

 grafting them would make this essay too long for this oc- 



