296 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



April 20, 190S. 



tied on a low plum-bush. I let the queen crawl into the swarm, which 

 wae a fine, large one. I then got a hive and placed it on a stool-chair 

 which I had covered with a canvas. 



I then arranged the frames against the sides, allowing the lower 

 part of the swarm to come between the frames. I gave the limb a 

 quick blow with an ax, and down they fell almost all into the hive, 

 and the rest on the canvas. I quickly placed the hive-canvas over the 

 seething mass, and to my delight saw those on the canvas soon 

 going toward the hive. With a weed I agitated them, and was glad to 

 to see almost all going into the hive. I gently lifted the frames in 

 place without removing the canvas, put the cover on, and my swarm 

 was hived. 



So intent had I been with my work that my husband had re- 

 turned, slipped up, and had been a silent witness of my performance, 

 so when I finished and looked up there he was grinning at me from 

 behind the plum-bush. And said, " Bravo ! Well done !" 



Well, in an hour my bees were workingasthough they had always 

 lived there. I was interested, and watched them a great deal. 



We examined them in 10 days, and I was delighted to find such 

 lovely sheets of well-filled comb, but found no eggs or brood. In a 

 few days we looked again, but still no brood. Finally the bees began 

 to dwindle, and I decided they must have a new queen. The old 

 clipped queen was there all the time. How I disliked to take out the 

 mother of so fine a swarm and kill her! My husband decided to put 

 her in his observatory hive and kept her for some time. 



We gave the bees a sheet of comb with brood and eggs from 

 which they reared a fine queen, built up, and went into winter quar- 

 ters in good condition. 



My clipped queen never, to our knowledge, laid an egg after she 

 came forth with the swarm. She left the parent hive well-filled with 

 brood and eggs. She was one year old. Although small, she was 

 considered one of my best queens. What was wrong with her? 



Saline Co., Kan. Mrs. F. G. B. 



You succeeded very nicely with your first attempt at hiving a 

 swarm, but let me tell you of an easier way to hive it when it has a 

 clipped queen. When the swarm comes out find the queen and put 

 her in a queen-cage (which is well to have handy before the bees 

 swarm). Now remove the hive from which the swarm issued to a 

 new stand, and put in its place the new hive. Lay the caged queen 

 on the entrance of the hive where you wish the swarm to go, and then 

 all you have to do is to stand still and watch those bees come back of 

 their own accord and hive themselves. 



When they have started crawling in nicely liberate the queen and 

 let her march in with the rest. That's all— easy, isn't it? But you 

 must not waste any time about it, or those bees may come back before 

 you are ready for them. 



I am sure I don't know why that queen should stop laying unless 

 she was accidentally injured in some way during the swarming. 



Using Honey from Hive Where Bees Died 



The bees in one of my hives are all dead, but there are left 3 

 frames full of honey and 3 that are more than half full. 



1. Do you think this honey will be all right to feed to any of the 

 other colonies, it they need it, or is there danger that something is 

 wrong with it? 



2. I had them packed well, with cushions on top. The bees were 

 in one end of the hive. Do you think they were queenless, or were 

 they killed by the cold? I did not notice any bad odor coming from 

 the hive, and there did not seem to be anything wrong except that 

 they were dead, and the hive was a little damp. 



Cumberland Co., N. J., March 8. Mrs. Sarah J. Griffith. 



1. I would feed it to the others. 



2. They may, and they may not, have been queenless. In any 

 case they were probably weak, and died of starvation, although there 

 was plenty of honey in the hive. Hiving used up all the honey within 

 reach, the continuous cold weather did not allow them to leave the 

 cluster to get a fresh supply. 



ITiv. pasty's 

 Clfkvti}onq>l}ts 



J 



The " Old Reliable " seen through New and Unreliable Glasses. 

 By E. E. Hasty, Sta. B Rural, Toledo, Ohio. 



THE HONET-PRODUCERS' LEAGUE AND COMB-HONET GUARANTEE. 



As to the League, and the exceedingly important matter presented 

 on page 259, I am not nearly ready to say all I think about it. On 

 one particular point I can say what I think. Don't, please don't, 

 raise the guarantee higher than a thousand dollars. The public have 

 more sense than you give them credit for, brethren. They have been 

 dazed and bored, and fairly forced, into a safe and sane conclusion bv 

 the myriad offers in the press of SoO, and $500, and SIOOO, and $10,000— 

 big money for something and everything and nothing— great sums for 

 solving little puzzles so childishly simple that one could hardly help 

 solving them if he tried. The safe refuge of conclusion has beeo 

 reached that business does not consist in giving away money, and that 



all such offers are deceptive — pure bluff it may be — prearranged it 

 may be— at the very least with some invisible string attached to them. 

 All folks with an atom of sense incline to pay no more heed to ihenr 

 than they do to the fat pocket-book that lies so temptingly on the walk 

 April Fool's Day. To illustrate what I mean, let me ask this ques- 

 tion: Why not offer a »iiWo« dollars? You reply. That would defeat 

 itself; because each man would laugh and say, "These people haven't 

 got a million dollars, and they are making no arrangements to raise 

 it." Well, just as little should we be making any arrangements to- 

 raise the $10,000 ; and (oiks would conclude so. The child's, " Bet 

 you five thousand million dollars," does not secure any assurance. 

 And when the quack doctor offers $10,000 for a case which his remedy 

 will not cure, few people hustle to get the money — in spite of the fact 

 that they k)ww that there are multitudes of incurable cases in the 

 world. Let's not imitate the quack doctor. The guarantees that have 

 have been offered in the past have silenced many people ; but probably 

 three-quarters of them have not been fully convinced — still inwardly 

 believed that comb honey was being manufactured — and also that it 

 would be foolishness to spend time and dollars in the effort to get that 

 money. 



What then? Either let the guarantee business rest just where it 

 is, or raise the sum and put it up in some bank window where the 

 incredulous can be sent to look at it. Buy a tirst-class, interest-bear- 

 ing, thousand dollar bond. Fully explain the whole sad matter to 

 some friendly State governor, and ask him to act as holder of the 

 bond, and to keep it deposited in the bank that will give it show-room. 

 Appoint three reliable men, only one of whom shall be a bee-keeper, 

 to act as awarding committee. Then we should have things in shape 

 so we could say, " Tell you right where you can see a thousand dollars 

 that you can have by proving what you have just been saying.'' 



FASTENING FOUNDATION TO SECTION'S FOUR SIDES. 



H. G. Sibbald, of -the Ontarios, seems to succeed in fastening foun- 

 dation to all four sides of a section. It doesn't bulge for him, w& 

 should infer, as bulged honey would hardly take first prizes. Page 146. 



GUARDING AGAINST INFECTION OF BEE-DISEASES. 



Prof. Harrison, of the Ontario Agricultural College, is one of 

 those who encourages the minimum amount of care in guarding 

 against the infection of bee-diseases. Even says that diseased bees, 

 when visiting flowers, miy leave infection there which healthy bees 

 may subsequently take. He also asserts that disease is sometimes 

 carried by foundation. Naturally he is not caught in the absurdity of 

 asking the apiculturist to disinfect his hands — and never mind disin- 

 fecting the hive, which has had foul-broody bees running over its walls 

 for months; and more or less daubed with foul-broody honey at that. 

 Page 14". 



SINGLE vs. DOUBLE BROOD-CHAMBER COLONT. 



A. E. Hoshal says a single broob-chamber colony (Heddon) will 

 give as much honey as a double brood-chamber colony in a short sea- 

 son. Wonder how he figures that out (providing it's so). Some of 

 us would say that strong colonies would have more advantage in short 

 flows than in long ones. Also, I should protest his don't care if old 

 bees are killed in uniting. Looks to me like a disgrace which a littlo 

 more care and '• gumption " would avoid. Page 149. 



=\ 



Doctor irtiller's 

 Question = Sox 



Send Questions either to the oflfice of the American Bee Journal, 

 or to Dr. C. C. Miller, Marengo, 111. 

 ' Dr. Miller does ?Mt answer Questions by mail. 



=/ 



Management In Swarming 



If when a colony casts its prime swarm I deprive it of its clipped 

 queen as she emerges from the hive, and 7 days later destroy all queen- 

 cells excpt one, will such colony be likely to swarm again, and would 

 such management be practical? Missouri. 



Answer.- It may work all right if you don't miss any cells. A 

 variation of the plan would be to wait till you hear the young queen 

 piping in the evening, and then cut out all cells next morning. You 

 would be a little surer of a good queen in this latter way, for it might 

 happen that by the first way you would leave a cell containing a dead 

 larva; for dead larvw are sometimes found in cells that look all right. 



Bees In the Attic— Inbreeding 



I have my bees in the attic facing east, and it is so arranged 

 that the temperature can be controlled during the winter months. 

 During our most severe weather the past winter it has not been below 

 33 degrees, and never above 40, unless the weather out-of-doors was 

 warm enough for them to have a Sight. 



1. What would be the best temperature and cause them to con- 

 sume the least amount of stores, with the hive-entrances open to the 

 weather at all times as they are now? 



2. Would the; consume less stores and winter more satisfactorily 



