June 15, 190S 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



421 



career. He had become acquainted with a 

 firm whicli started a sash and door business, 

 but which dissolved a few years later by 

 dividing the assets of the business. 



One of the former members of this firm, 

 living in Wisconsin, and running a sash and 

 door factory there, made him business man- 

 ager in St. Louis, to assist his young son 

 whom he made his partner. The business 

 went on for a few years when the senior 

 member of the firm died, and the son and Mr. 

 H. bought the business and continued it un- 

 der the Arm name of Gray A: Holekamp. 



Their business grew rapidly, and soon be- 

 came one of the largest of its kind in the 

 country, their customers being all over the 

 South and West, and every new railroad in 

 their territory brought new trade. 



A few years later the former partner of his 

 old employer lost his health. They bought 

 him out and moved into his just finished, 

 new and commodious quarters. After a few 

 years more Mr. H. bought out his partner, 

 and continued the business in his own name. 



The continuous strain of managing a large 

 business, and at the same time doing a good 

 deal of traveling to viork up new territory, 

 gradually told on his health, and finding that 

 rest was necessary, he sold his business. 



After he was through winding up his old 

 business affairs, he looked around for some 

 business where he could spend his time out 

 in the open air, and soon bought an interest 

 in a sawmill and timber-lands in southeast 

 Missouri, and incorporated the business. 



He and his family lived there for a number 

 of years, right in the wilderness, away from 

 civilization, and surrounded only by about 50 

 little houses, the dwellings of his milkhands 

 and teamsters. Mr. Holekamp says those 

 years in the wilderness were the happiest of 

 his life. He was busy from early till late, but 

 enjoyed splendid health, and soon built up a 

 nice business, but the necessity of giving their 

 children a better education than it was pos- 

 sible to give them in the backwoods, com- 

 pelled him to give up business again and to 

 return to St. Louis. There he bought an in- 



terest in a surgical instrument business, 

 which he sold several years ago. 



Mr. H. kept hie old sawmill home for a 

 number of years, running a farm and spend- 

 ing the summers there during the time of the 

 children's school vacation, but sold it a few 

 years ago, it being rather unhandy to run a 

 farm so far away. He has no business now 

 except looking after his rented property and 

 attending to his bees, which keeps him as 

 busy as he cares to be. He has kept bees for 

 the last 1.5 years, and considers the work 

 with them the most interesting outdoor em- 

 ployment he can find, » 



It will be seen from the foregoing sketch 

 that Mr. Holekamp has had a very extensive 

 as well as successful business experience 

 aside from his 15 years of bee-keeping. It 

 would seem that he will prove to be a very 

 valuable member of the Executive Board of 

 The Honey-Producers' League. He is right 

 in his prime, and should be quite an addition 

 to the ranks of those who ate endeavoring to 

 improve the keeping of bees as a business. 



4- (Eontributcb -f 

 Special Clrticlcs 



=\ 



J' 



Securing Large Increase— Keeping Queens 



BY G. M. DOOI.ITTLE 



IN a lat« number of the American Bee Journal I closed what 

 I had to say with the remark that " I was open to any 

 further question on the subject." This has brought me a 

 lot of questions, and in this I will try to a,nswer briefly those 

 from a man in West Virginia. 



He first wishes to know how I would work to secure a 

 large increase, something like that which I wrote about as 

 given in the April 27 issue of the American Hee Journal, only 

 that he wishes to use comb foundation instead of frames filled 

 with combs. IJees can not be increased as fast where founda- 

 tion is to be used as with plenty of drawn combs ; but thoy 

 can be increased faster where comb foundation is provided 

 than is possible where the combs are to be built in frames 

 having only starters in them. In using foundation, proceed 

 the same as I gave in that article until quite a few young bees 

 have emerged in the spring, and the colonies you have are 

 beginning to get fairly prosperous, when a frame of founda- 

 tion is to be put in each colony between two frames contain- 

 ing brood, and left one, two or three days, as is necessary for 

 the bees to draw out the side-walls to the cells from >g to '+ 

 of an inch, but not long enough for the queen to lay many 

 eggs in these drawn-out cells. If honey is not coming in from 

 the fields in sufficient quantities for the bees to think they can 

 work on the foundation, then the colonies must be fed in suf- 

 ficient quantities for them to do so. In this way keep on till 

 you have sufficient frames of this drawn foundation to proceed 

 as I gave in that April 27 issue of the American Bee Journal. 



Having these frames of drawn foundation, go to making 

 your colonies as there given, and if you can not procure 

 enough frames so fixed from the few colonies you have in the 

 spring, those which you will make will work foundation as 

 soon as their queens get well to laying, and thus these new 

 colonies will help along with the work. But always remem- 

 ber that it is useless to try to make any very weak colonies 

 contribute to any part of this work. Far better wait a little 

 for all to get strong enough to do this work to advantage. 



If you do not have foundation enough to use full sheets in 

 all of your frames, then use the larger part of it as above, 

 when the rest can be cut into strips of four rows of cells each 

 and fastened to the top-bars of the frames, when, in due time, 

 they are to be placed in between the combs of the colonics 

 you have made (those having young queens), when the bees will 

 build them down with comb of the worker size of cells. 

 Remember you imist feed at all times when nectar is not com- 

 ing in from the fields, if you would have foundation drawn 

 out, or combs built from starters, as the bees will do nothing 

 at this work in times of a famine of nectar. 



KEEPING QUEENS UNTIL NEEDED— QUEBN-NURSKRY. 



The writer next wants to know how he can keep queens 

 when he buys them, till he is ready to use them, and also what 

 a queen-nursery is. I will answer the last question first. 



A queen-nursery is a frame having cages in it, each cage 

 of which is fixed for the accommodation of one queen. The 

 cages are generally made out of a piece of inch lumber, the 

 same being cut about 3 inches square. In the center of this 

 piece a 2-inch hole is bored, and then two % holes are bored 

 through the edge of the piece till they open into the large 

 hole. Now the large hole is covered on both sides with wire- 

 cloth, and one of the small holes filled with "queen candy," 

 or a sponge filled with honey for food for the queen, while the 

 other is left for a doorway to be used in putting the queen in 

 and letting her out. Both holes are to be closed with a proper 

 sized cork, so that the bees from any colony into which it is 

 put can not get to either the queen or her food. 



When you have enough of these cages made to fill an 

 empty frame, and they are put in place so that the frame is 

 full, that frame of cages is called a " queen-nursery." 



And to use it, provision the food apartment, run in the 

 queen or queens, and hang the nursery in place of a brood- 

 frame in any colony. Some think it best to hang this nursery, 

 when the queens are in it, in a queenless colony, and others 

 are equally sure that it is best to keep it in a colony having a 

 laying queen, as the bees in a queenless colony will cluster on 

 the most of the cages, and try as much as they can to torment 

 the queens in these blocks or cages of the nursery. Itut, with 

 me, the bees will cluster on the blocks to a greater or less ex- 

 tent, no matter into what colony they are placed, and, as a 

 rule, I do not like to keep queens thus longer than can be 

 helped, as it is against " queen nature " to be thus confined, 

 which is often shown by the queens dying after being so con- 

 fined for from a week to a month. 



I use these nurseries most largely where I have more 

 "ripe" queen-cells than I can use just at the time they are 

 ripe. Just put the ripe cell into the hole that is used as a 

 doorway for the (lueen, and when the virgin emerges she is in 

 the cage, ready to be used just as soon after she has emerged 

 as possible, for I consider that the shorter time she is in this 

 or any other cage, the better queen she will make. 



Next, and last, the questiom^r wishes to know more about 

 slipping the queen-excluding zinc down into a hive so that 

 queen-cells will be built in the side not having the qiieen, 

 which I mentioned in the other article, this plan being used in 

 early spring, or at any other time when colonies are not strong 

 enough to rear queen-cells in an upper story. 



Take one of your hives and nail on a tight bottom-board. 

 Now, if you have a 10-frame hivi", put in a sheet of the per- 

 forated metal just where the fouith frame would stand when 

 the hive has the whole 10 frames in it. This is best done by 

 making a saw-kerf, just there, in each end of the hive on the 

 inside, so that this sheet of zinc .an be slipped in and out at 

 pleasure. 



Now slip in the sheet of queen-excluding metal or zinc, 

 and make sure that there are no places where the queen can 

 get above it, around it, or under it, when you are ready to 

 take It out to the apiary and phue one of your strongest col- 

 onies in it. To do this, look ovrr the combs of the strong 

 colony till you find the (jueen, when the comb she is on is to 

 be set out of the hive till you have things arranged. Having 

 found the queen, you will set in the smaller side of your pre- 



