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AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



Aug. 2, 1900. 



How a Swarm Was Lost— A Confession and 

 Warning'. 



BY HARRY lATHROP. 



I WANT to tell about a blunder I made the other day at 

 the Browntown yard, whereby I lost a large swarm of 

 bees, the result of over-confidence, growing out of a 

 long experience with dipt queens. For year.s we have not 

 known of a swarm leaving our yards for the woods; but to 

 the woods away went the swarm above mentioned, right 

 before the gaping, astonisht bee-keeper. It was thus : 



The Browntown yard is run, to all practical purposes, 

 as an out-yard. I have a helper who works there during the 

 forenoon, and I go down on the train at noon and remain 

 on dut}' until evening. My home, be it known, is at the 

 Monroe yard, eight miles east, at present. It was just 3:15 

 p.m., and I was thinking that all swarming was over for 

 the day, when out came No. 46. They were strong, and 

 were working in two supers, the top one of which was full 

 of nice, white honey nearly ready to come oflf. As mj' cus- 

 tom is, I pickt up a queen-cage and went over to the hive 

 and watcht for the queen, but I did not see her. I supposed 

 that perhaps she had failed to come out, as is often the case, 

 and that the bees would soon come back. But as they clus- 

 tered and hung quietly in a tree near by, I thought I would 

 better investigate a little. I first turned to the record of 

 No. 46 in the book ; it read, " April 28, queen dipt, probably 

 '98." 



I nest went to the hive, thinking that perhaps they had 

 superseded the old queen, and had swarmed out with a 

 newly hatcht virgin. But wen I went into the brood-cham- 

 ber I found it in a normal condition, but full of brood in all 

 stages, including newly-laid eggs. Now, I was positive 

 that the queen of this hive was a dipt queen when the 

 record was made in the spring. So I concluded that the old 

 queen was yet present, and knowing that she could not fly I 

 expected that the bees would hang in the tree awhile, then 

 uncluster and go back to the hive. 



I was busy in another part of the yard (wlien I ought to 

 have been getting that swarm down), and after a%vhile I 

 heard something. Looking up I saw ray swarm high in the 

 air, and starting for some eastern point. No use trying to 

 stop them — might just as well save your strength and time 

 on as hot a day as that was. I stood there disgusted and 

 ashamed of. myself for such blundering work. If one of 

 my men had done so — well, there was no one to scold me. 

 A woman in a neighboring house came out with a tin pan 

 and gave it a few taps, but saw that it was useless work 

 trying to stop those bees. She called, asking if they were 

 mine. Mine ! Alas, they were once, but now they belong 

 to whoever maj' find them. Thej' are gone, and so is the 

 five to ten dollars worth of fancy comb honey they would 

 have produced had I saved them. Let them go. 



But why did they go ? I will tell you what I think. 

 That colony had superseded their old queen rather early — 

 soon after the record was made; the young queen had 

 mated and gone on laying without my discovery of the fact. 

 When I saw them hanging so contentedly in the tree I 

 should have taken no chances, altho I have seen them clus- 

 ter and hang quite awhile, the queen in the meantime be- 

 ing caged at the entrance of a prepared hive on the old 

 stand ready for the return of the swarm. 



Working as I have with dipt queens so long, and hav- 

 ing such an easy time of it, made me too confident, and 

 j'ou know on a hot day a fellow doesn't like to climb trees to 

 get swarms. But the fellow who neglects to do so when he 

 doesn't know he knows, ought to have a club. — Wisconsin 

 Agriculturist. Green Co., Wis. 



York's Honey Calendar for ipoo is a 16-page pamph- 

 let especially gotten up to create a demand for honey among 

 should-be consumers. The forepart was written by Dr. 

 C. C. Miller, and is devoted to general information concern- 

 ing honey. The latter part consists of recipes for use in 

 cooking and as a medicine. It will be found to be a very 

 effective helper in working up a home market for honey. 

 We furnish them, postpaid, at these prices : A sample 

 free ; 25 copies for 30 cents ; 50 for SO cents ; 100 for 90 

 cents ; 250 for $2.00 ; 500 for S3.50. For 25 cents extra we 

 will print your name and address on the front page, when 

 ordering 100 or more copies at these prices. 



The Premiums offered this week are well worth work- 

 ing for. Look at them. 



CONDUCTED BY 



DR. C. O. AlILI^ER. Marengo, 111, 



[The Qnestions may be mailed to the Bee Journal oflfice, or to Dr. Miller 



direct, when he will answer them here. Please do not ask the 



Doctor to send answers by mail. — Editor. 1 



Queen With a Leg Off. 



A queen sent me arrived in a feeble condition, with one 

 leg torn off. Will such a queen be of any value if success- 

 fully introduced ? Illinois. 



Answer. — A queen so badly maltreated by the bees as 

 to have her leg torn off might do good work afterward, but 

 the chances would be against it. You do not say so, but I 

 suppose the ill treatment was received in the attempt to in- 

 troduce her, for a queen would hardly receive stich treat- 

 ment from her own bees in the cage. 



Altho I would not think it proper to send out a queen 

 lacking a leg, yet I have had several such queens that did 

 excellent work. The leg, however, was probably lacking 

 from birth, and was not torn off by the bees in these cases. 



A Queen Question. 



I received a Dr. Miller queen and succeeded in introduc- 

 ing her into a colonj' which had just swarmed four days 

 before. I pulled down all queen-cells I found, snd more on 

 Friday last. The queen never stopt piping from the time 

 she was releast until to-day, when the colony swarmed and 

 went away. I opened the hive and found some worker and 

 drone brood about hatcht. and two queen-cells not sealed, 

 with the larva; in them ; also one cell sealed, but not an egg 

 or sign of young brood of any description other than the 

 two queen-cells. Did the queen not lay any, or did the bees 

 destroy her eggs ? I feel sore about losing the queen, as I 

 intended to divide the colony to-day. Ontario. 



Answer. — It was not the introduced queen that did the 

 piping and left with the swarm, but a virgin queen that was 

 free in the hive. The queen sent you could not have gone 

 off with the swarm, for both wings on one side were dipt so 

 she could not fly. It is a very unusual thing for a second 

 swarm to leave 20 days after the prime swarm ; and in this 

 case it looks a little as if there were two factions in the 

 hive, one insisting that the stranger should rule, and the 

 other insisting that the virgin should be mistress, the strife 

 delaying the swarming. It is possible that the introduced 

 (lueen may have been allowed to lay a few eggs, for it some- 

 times occurs that a queen is allowed to lay a very few eggs, 

 perhaps in queen-cells, and is still rejected. 



Perhaps Bee-Paralysis. 



I have one colony of bees that in June, 1899, cast a 

 good-sized swarm, which I hived, and it did and is doing 

 all right, but the parent colony, after the young queen got 

 to laying, and the young bees had hatcht out and com- 

 menced playing, there would be scores of bees that would 

 come out on the alighting-board, rub their abdomens and 

 wings with their hind legs, but would be unable to take a 

 flight, and so they would crawl away from the hive, con- 

 tinuing to make the effort to fly, but could not ; and the 

 same was true of them all last spring and summer. These 

 bees come out at the time the young bees take their play- 

 spell. I can not see any difference between them and those 

 that can fly. 



What is the probable reason whj' they can not fly ? Is 

 it possible that the queen may be at fault in some way ? I 



