602 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



and carefully save all the wax thus 

 obtained. I have with me also a 

 wheelbarrow prepared expressly for 

 carrying combs and tools that I use 

 among the bees. This wheelbarrow 

 is indispensable, and yet it is cheaply 

 and simply made. 



This honey- carriage stands by me as 

 I open the hive, and as I scrape the 

 wax from the hive-cover, I sometimes 

 find with that wax a little honey, 

 which should be kept from the bees, 

 so I open the comb-box on the car- 

 riage, and with a quick motion throw 

 the wax into it ; and as there is a four- 

 inch open space below the hanging 

 combs in the comb-box, the wax goes 

 down out of the way until it can be 

 cared for 



In a future article I will continue 

 the description of ray management, 

 and also tell how and why the combs 

 in the super that I have thus opened 

 are well spread apart ; and how, as I 

 examine them from the top-bars, or 

 look down between them, I can judge 

 very correctly whether part or all are 

 ready to be taken away. I have a boy 

 to handle the smoker and to assist me 

 by running short errands, while I do 

 the most of the more particular work. 



Orion, ? Wis. 



Read at the Maine Conventton. 



Successful ■Wintering of Bees. 



R. S. TORKEY. 



One point in which scientific bee- 

 keepers widely differ, is in the win- 

 tering of bees. Some recommend one 

 method and some another. I differ 

 from the most of them, and having 

 been successful for the last ten years, 

 I will describe my manner of winter- 

 ing bees. 



It is well understood by scientific 

 bee-keepers that the queen deposits 

 her eggs and the young bees are 

 reared in or near the centre of the 

 combs, and the honev is stored in the 

 combs outside of the brood-nest, the 

 extreme outer combs usually being 

 occupied by the bees -for storing 

 honey. When it becomes cold in the 

 fall, the bees huddle together in a 

 cluster in the empty brood-comb 

 where the young bees have hatched 

 out, and as they are obliged to re- 

 main in this cluster during cold 

 weather, there is but one direction in 

 which the cluster can move to obtain 

 their food, and that is directly up- 

 ward. 



Heated air always rises, and the 

 animal heat of the cluster of bees 

 will warm the honey al)ove them so 

 that they can move in that direction 

 to secure their food until all the honey 

 above the cluster is consumed ; then 

 if the weather continues cold, so that 

 they are not able to leave their clus- 

 ter, they will starve to death with 

 plenty of honey at their sides and be- 

 low them, lam of the opinion that 

 75 out of every 100 colonies that die 

 in this State, die of starvation during 

 the winter months, with plenty of 

 honey at their sides and below them. 

 In low, flat hives bees will occupy 

 nearly the whole depth of the hive 

 for their brood-comb, leaving no 



chance to store their winter supplies 

 over them, but are obliged to store it 

 at their sides, where they are unable 

 to reach it in cold weather. 



I winter my bees on the summer 

 stands, and in the fall, on approach of 

 cold weather, I take all their honey 

 from their sides and place it imme- 

 diately over them in the top of the 

 hive, putting all the empty combs in 

 the lower part of tlie hive for the bees 

 to cluster upon. 1 then make a whole 

 box without top or bottom, and set it 

 over the hive, the box being large 

 enough to leave three or four inches of 

 space between the outside of the hive 

 and the inside of the box. I then till 

 the space with some non-conductor of 

 heat and cold. I consider sawdust 

 the best, but for the want of sawdust 

 I have used leaves, boughs, meadow- 

 hay and straw. Some 15 years ago I 

 used chaff for packing, but after using 

 it for three or four years I abandoned 

 its use tor the following reasons : 



1. Chaff is liable to contain more or 

 less seed, which is very inviting to 

 mice, and mice are very fond of ob- 

 taining access to the inside of a bee- 

 hive, and often destroy whole colo- 

 nies, eating bees, honey and the comb. 

 2. If the chalf is not kept perfectly 

 dry it will mold and become very 

 offensive to the bees. 3. It is ex- 

 pensive. 



After filling in the space between 

 the hive and box, I cover the top of 

 the hive with a thick straw-cushion, 

 and over the whole a tight cover is 

 placed to keep it dry ; and after I have 

 them thus prepared, I no more ex- 

 pect to lose my bees in winter than I 

 do my sheep, hogs, or any other farm 

 stock. 



My advice is, keep your bees in win- 

 ter, cool, dry, quiet and dark, with 

 moderate veiitilatiou according to the 

 population of the colony, and pro- 

 tected from the sudden changes of 

 temperature, with plenty of good, 

 well-capped honey directly over them 

 to winter on. 



For tlie Amerlcaa Bee JoumaL 



Direct Introduction of Queens, etc. 



WILLIAM DAVID SLADE. 



Mr. Abel Gresh. on page 506, says 

 that he is fully convinced that the 

 Simmins' method of direct introduc- 

 tion of queens, is "not a safe one," 

 and doubts if he could " succeed with 

 it in a single instance, unless under 

 peculiar circumstances." It is to be 

 hoped that he speaks thus only for 

 himself, and not even for those with 

 but little knowledge of queen intro- 

 duction. 



As an amateur, last year, I intro- 

 duced 3 Italian queens on the same 

 day of their arrival by mail, by simply 

 letting 2 of them walk between the 

 top of the frames, and the other on 

 the old cage-plan. All were equally 

 accepted and did well. This year I 

 have introduced, as Mr. Simmins 

 directs, 20 or .30 queens, .some after a 

 long journey, and others out of my 

 own apiary ; some on their own combs 

 at the top of the frames, and others 

 at the entrance of the hive, etc., un- 



der various conditions, and at differ- 

 ent times of the day. All were ac- 

 cepted but 4 that came from a dis- 

 tance, and I had no proof that they 

 were in good laying condition. 



In the case of valuable queens it is 

 best, as Mr. Simmins directs, to con- 

 fine them on a frame for three days, 

 thus enabling the queen to recover 

 from her journey and confinement, 

 and to start them in a nucleus, though 

 I have not foiuid them to fail when 

 put in full colonies. Last month I 

 received somevakiable Syrian queens, 

 and these I confined on a frame for 

 three days in full colonies, in one case 

 removing, the queen of the hive in 

 which the Syrian was confined, and 

 releasing the Syrian queen. In the 

 other I took out a queen of a full col- 

 ony, and introduced the foreigner at 

 the same time, to be accepted as 

 usual. 



If such articles as Mr. Gresh's are 

 left unchallenged, they are liable to 

 mislead and discourage bee-keeping 

 by making it troublesome, and occu- 

 pying unnecessary time. Time is 

 money. Speaking for others and my- 

 self, we gladly recognize our debt of 

 gratitude to Mr. Simmins for giving 

 us a successful, easy, and quick 

 method of queen introduction ; as 

 well as for his system of dry-sugar 

 feeding, enabling those of us who 

 have little time to spend from busi- 

 ness, to keep profitably 50 colonies 

 with less fatigue and time than we 

 could formerly keep 20. 



I take this opportunity to send my 

 membership fee and first assessment 

 for the National Bee-Keepers' Union. 

 Our bee-keepers are necessarily in- 

 terested in the result of your pending 

 trial, and in such a grand year as this 

 has proven to us, every one should 

 thankfully contribute his mite. 

 Cheltenham, Eng., Sept. 2, 1885. 



For tlie American Bee Journal. 



Nursery and ftueen-Cage. 



W. n. THORNE. 



Mr. Alley's combination nursery 

 and queen-cage, as described on pa^e 

 .520, is certainly very ingenious, and 

 will be appreciated by a great many ; 

 but I am of the opinion that the same 

 results can be secured with a Peet 

 queen-cage, without the necessity of 

 removing a frame from the hive that 

 it is to be operated upon. The ordi- 

 nary Peet cage is about H of an inch 

 in thickness, and consequently little 

 displacement of the frames are neces- 

 sary. The way to transform a Peet 

 cage into one like Mr. Alley's, is as 

 follows : 



Make a %-inch hole in the edge of 

 the. cage, into the candy, and for a 

 cover take a piece of tin >^xl inch, 

 and with a wire nail on one end of the 

 tin, it will revolve over the hole,' or 

 can be turned half way around, and 

 be out of the way when the candy is 

 to be exposed for the release of the 

 queen. 



For the nursery or queen-cells, drive 

 a pin through the edge of the cage 

 into the large hole, in a manner that 

 when the cage is suspended by one 



