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( Entered at the Post-Office at Chicago as Second-Class Mail-Matterj 

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OBORQE W. YORK, Editor 



CHICAGO, ILL, JULY 20,1905 



VoL XLV— Na 29 



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(fbttorial Hotes ^ (Eommcnts 



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Locality in Bee-Keeping 



A ffcw years ago it became somewhat the 

 fashion to make a joke of the matter of 

 locality, possibly because some attributed to 

 locality things not fairly due to it. But its 

 real importance can not be pooh-poohed out 

 of existence. The fact that in Australia bees 

 are busily working at Christmas, and are in 

 winter quarters July 4, is a mere matter of 

 locality ; as also the fact that in the southern 

 part of the United States bees are at work 

 weeks before they are out of winter quarters 

 in the North. 



Bui differences of locality are not alone 

 shown by parallels of latitude. Differences of 

 flora or other differences may be such that a 

 plan of work in a certain place may be excel- 

 lent, while not at all appropriate in another 

 place only a little distance away. For ex- 

 ample, a bee-keeper in a part of Illinois where 

 clover is the chief, if not the sole, source of 

 surplus, might be somewhat puzzled upon I 

 reading of P. H. Elwood's plan of manage- 

 ment, and would be likely to say : 



" I don't quite see how I could carry that 

 out. I'm to dequeen no colony, if I under- 

 stand correctly, until it is found making prep- 

 arations for swarming. Then the cells are to 

 be removed just before they would hatch, 

 which would be in 10 days or more. Then a 

 cell is given, and it will be another 10 days 

 before the young queen will lay, or something 

 like 3 weeks after the colony is dequeened. 

 Then we are told, ' This operation should be 

 timed so the young queen will begin to lay at 

 the lime of the opening of the main harvest.' 

 That is, the dequeening must take place when 

 the bees are found preparing to swarm, and it 

 must be about 3 weeks before the opening of 

 the main harvest. But bees don't prepare to 

 swarm till the opening of the main harvest; 

 60 how can I dequeen when they are found 

 preparing to swarm, and yet do It 3 weeks 

 before the harvest ? I don't understand it at 

 all." 



He will understand it better if he under- 

 stands that Mr. Elwood's main harvest is 

 probably basswood, which comes lat».r than 



tte opening of the white clover harvest ; so 

 that it would be an impossibility for the said 

 Illinois bee-keeper to carry out Mr. Elwood's 

 plan, however good it might be in a basswood 

 " locality " in New York State. 



The moral of which is, that while one is to 

 study plans and practices of bee-keepers in all 

 localities, yet in applying the knowledge so 

 gained one must keep clearly in view the dif- 

 ference in locality. 



Giving Brood to Shaken Swarms 



In shaking swarms, some advise giving a 

 frame of brood to hold the swarm, others say 

 the frame of brood will make the swarm 

 desert, and prefer no brood, while still others 

 advise giving a frame of brood and then tak- 

 ing it away as soon as the swarm becomes 

 sufficiently attached to the new home. Just 

 how long it takes for them to become suffi- 

 ciently attached may be an open question. J. 

 A. Green, after saying that swarms deserted 

 for him when given a frame of brood, was 

 asked whether such desertion occurred on the 

 day of shaking or several days after. He thus 

 replies in Gleanings in Bee Culture: 



I believe they all came out again the day 

 after they were hived. Two years ago a large 

 percentage, to many of which brood had been 

 given, swarmed out the next day. Some of 

 them, though, were hived in only one section 

 of my hive, with supers above. This season, 

 all swarms, artiticial or natural, were hived 

 in two sections of the brood -chamber, gen- 

 erally with only starters in the frames, and 

 without brood, except in the case of two or 

 three afterswarms. Two or three days there- 

 after the lower section was taken away, leav- 

 ing them in a brood-chamber six inches in 

 depth, having the capacity of about five 

 Langstroth frames. So far as known not one 

 of them swarmed out. Of course, supers were 

 given them at the time they were hived. 



Mr. Elwood's plan, having an idea that th 

 thing to do was to keep colonies queenless a 

 longer time than was done by him. It seems, 

 however, that Mr. Elwood's plan might be 

 called requeening rathei than dequeening, or, 

 to be more exact, dequeening and requeening. 

 Here is Mr. Elwood's scheme of manage- 

 ment, as given in the Bee-Keepers' Review by 

 Irving Kinyon, who, with one other man, 

 helped Mr. Elwood lake care of 1300 colonies: 



" We discouraged swarming until we were 

 ready to remove the queens. Then, if any 

 were found preparing to swarm, the queen 

 was removed, also one frame of bees and 

 brood. If the queen was an extra good one 

 she was put in an empty hive with the frame 

 of brood. The next 6 or 7 colonies dequeened 

 had their queens killed and one frame of 

 brood from each taken to put with the queen 

 that was saved, which made the increase. 



" The eggs that these queens would have 

 laid, if they had been left in the hive, would 

 hatch after the main honey-flow. 



"After dequeening began, each yard was 

 gone through and the cells removed just be- 

 fore they would hatch. Since there had been 

 no eggs laid for several days when the cells 

 were destroyed the second time, the bees had 

 given up all idea of swarming, but were very 

 anxious to have a queen. We now select a 

 cell from some colony preparing to swarm, 

 place it in a West cage and give it to the de- 

 queened colony. This operation should be 

 limed so the young queen will begin to lay at 

 the time of the opening of the main harvest, 

 and this colony will have its share of surplus 

 honey, as this plan prevents the bees from 

 dividing their working force at the beginning 

 of the best harvest; and also gives tbem a 

 vigorous young queen during the honey-flow. 

 In destroying these cells we must be sure that 

 we don't skip even a small one, or it may up- 

 set the whole plan." 



Preventing Swarming by Dequeening 



Some years ago a good deal was said about 

 management by making colonies queenless to 

 prevent swarming. P. H. Elwood used the 

 plan successfully, but others reported failure. 

 Possibly they did not understand correctly 



Freslily-Hived Swarms Deserting 



A common question from beginners runs 

 something like this: 



" I hived a swarm, and the next day it 

 sailed off to parts unknown. What shall I do 

 to prevent such a thing in the future?" 



The most frequent cause of such desertion 

 is heat. A hive unshaded, standing out in the 

 broiling sun with a very small entrance and 

 all the rest closed tight, is a pretty warm place 

 in which to set up housekeeping, and one can 

 hardly blame the newly-settled family for 

 moving out. 



The remedy is not diflBcult to imagine. If 

 possible, let the hive be in a cool, shady place. 

 A temporary shade, and sprinkling with 



