TMW MMMMICAIf MMK JO'KJRIfSI<. 



363 



the spring, provided, of course, if it 

 is good, health}- feed for the bees. 



I read the American Bee Journal 

 with great interest, and if my experi- 

 ence with my little apiary will give en- 

 couragement to other beginners, I will 

 be very glad. My reported success 

 has caused five of my neighbors to 

 have me purchase 7 colonies of bees 

 for them, for their own use only ; and 

 if I could spare any of mine, I could 

 get from .^7.50 to 110.00 per colony. 

 In fact I have been offered 110.00 for a 

 colon}' several times. 



Campbell, Nebr., May 20, 1889. 



LAYING WORKERS. 



How I ]nanag;c to Oet Rid of 

 tliese Pests. 



Written for the Prairie Farmer 



BY MRS. L. HARRISON. 



Where a colony has been a long 

 time queenless, some of the workers 

 aspire to motherhood and lay, but their 

 eggs invariably produce drones. Lay- 

 ing workers lay very irregularly in 

 worker-comb, and build out the cells 

 to accommodate their huge bodies. 

 Their presence can be told at a glance, 

 as the cells are scattered here and 

 there, and not joined together as they 

 would be if the queen were a drone 

 layer. Laying workers cannot be dis- 

 tinguished from other workers, as they 

 look alike, so they cannot be destroyed. 

 They are a nuisance in a hive, for they 

 will destroy a queen as soon as intro- 

 duced. And, even if they allow a 

 young queen to emerge from a cell, 

 they will destroy her on her return 

 from her bridal tour. As many as a 

 dozen laying workers have been seen 

 upon one comb. 



There are several ways of getting 

 rid of these pests. One way is to carry 

 the hive away, and put another in its 

 place. The combs in the laying- 

 worker hive can have the bees brushed 

 off and returned to the hive on the old 

 stand, and accept a fertile queen, while 

 the would-be queens will not. 



The way that I manage a colony that 

 has laying workers is as follows : I 

 take out all the combs excepting the 

 two outsde ones ; then I go to a strong 

 colony and remove a frame or two, as 

 the strength of the colony may war- 

 rant, covered with bees, being careful 

 not to remove the queen, and put them 

 into the laying-worker colony, and fill 

 their place with the combs taken from 

 the laying workers. 



If I have no queen to introduce, I let 

 them rear one. These new bees that 

 are introduced will have no nonsen,se, 

 and will dispose of the laying workers 

 in their own time and way. 



^^^ » — »^»^»;^^^^^^^^^ 



Prevention is belter than cure, for 

 just as sure as a colony of bees is left 

 without a queen, or the means of rear- 

 ing another, for two weeks, tlie pests 

 will appear. When 1 have a queenless 

 colony that I have given eggs and 

 larvas to rear a queen, while she is 

 being reared, every four or five days 1 

 give them a fresh comb containing 

 eggs and larva;, which gives the bees 

 employment, and seems to keep up the 

 the strength of the colony. If one is 

 given them about the time the queen 

 emerges from the cell, it will furnish 

 them the means of rearing another, if 

 she is lost on hei- bridal tour. 



Peoria, Ills. 



FREAKS OF BEES. 



Race Peculiarity, or Freaks of 

 Some Bees. 



Written for the American Bee Journal 



BY S. D. HASKIN. 



The following are some of the freaks 

 of bees that have occurred under my 

 own observation : On one occasion 

 three swarms clustered together, and 

 were hived in two liives ; but one hive 

 had probably two-thirds of the bees, 

 and they showed that they had a pref- 

 erence to one hive. As soon as they 

 were inside, they were located, and all 

 seemed lovely until the next morning ; 

 when the one with the most bees mani- 

 fested much discontent, or uneasiness, 

 and about 12 o'clock (it being quite 

 warm) it swarmed and clustered. It 

 was hived all right, and did nicely, 

 having a queen ; one was in the other 

 hive, and did equally well. These 

 were all first swarms. 



As it is quite common that bees 

 swarm but once, I have often let them 

 have their own way about it, and in 

 case of a second swarm, I locate them 

 close by the parent colony for a day or 

 two, and then cut out queen-cells, and 

 place the young swarm on top of the 

 old colony, and generally they will go 

 below and stay with tlie old bees ; on 

 two occasions the young queen passed 

 down through the old colony and be- 

 came fertilized, returned, and set up 

 house-keeping; and, as far as I could 

 determine, they did just as well as 

 though on separate stands. There was 

 but one entrance, and that was in the 

 old hive. 



The summer and fall of 1887 was 

 very dry, so that there were no young 

 bees for wintering, but had the follow- 

 ing spring been as early as usual, I 

 think that bees would have done toler- 

 ably well ; but it was very backward, 

 wet and cold, so that the old bees 

 mostly died before they could rear 

 young bees to take their places ; so I 



doubled up the little clusters left, as 

 best I could, and late in the season 

 there were two, I thought, to unite, 

 standing side by side ; 1 placed one 

 upon the other, and about this time 

 they began to build up a little. I 

 watched them closely, and they did so 

 well that after a while I separated 

 them again, and they did well last fall, 

 and have wintered nicely. The young 

 swarm that I had May 12 is building 

 up finely. 



Waterville, Maine, May 17, 1889. 



NEW HONEY. 



How a Yoiillifiii Bee-Kec|>er 

 Seciirctl Early Honey. 



Written ior the American Bee Journal 

 BY W. A. HODGE. 



I want to tell how a young hand at 

 the business has " played it " on some 

 of us older heads. I shall personate 

 him as Charley Lawrence, of Victory, 

 Wis., who has some 53 colonies of bees 

 that were given to him by his aged 

 father, who is now deceased. 



Charley wintered the 53 colonies in 

 the cellar, and this spring, early in 

 March, he took them out, all strong 

 and I'oariug. Their first drive was to 

 the islands of the old Mississippi, and 

 they came home loaded with pollen 

 and honey ; so Charley concluded that 

 they meant business, and he sent at 

 once to the American Bee Journal 

 office for a lot of sections. 



The sections came on short notice 

 (as does everything ordered from that 

 office), and with all possible speed he 

 put them on, long before any of us 

 thought of putting on sections. Now 

 what has been the result ? Why, 

 Charley came to my house the other 

 morning with the broadest smile on 

 his face that you ever saw, and in his 

 hand he held "a new, white, one-pound 

 section of honey, and said to me. 

 "Look here, old" man, don't you want 

 some new honey for your breakfast ?" 



1 will admit that 1 was somewhat 

 surprised, and said : " Why, Charley, 

 where did you get that ?" " Oh," he 

 said, " I just took it off the hive." I 

 said, " Yes, you did ! !" 



" Well," said he, " if you don't be- 

 lieve it, just go down with me and see. 

 I have between 1,500 and 1,600 one- 

 pound sections nearly capped, and will 

 be ready to come off inside of a week." 



Why, this idea of letting a young lad 

 come to the front with 1,(500 pounds of 

 new white honey, this early in May, 

 and that away up in cold Wisconsin— 

 whv, surely, I for one take a back 

 seat, and call this a " conundrum," and 

 say, Charlev, go it while your young t 



Victory, Wis., May 25, 1889. 



