ik; 



THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER 



July 



the consignator has not reached me. 

 Mr. Greiner; might, perhaps, find some- 

 thing in the German papers. 



2nd. — Equalization. That is taking 

 brood from the stronger colonies to 

 strengthen the weak ones. This is al- 

 most an entirely new thing in Europe- 



3rd. — Transposition. The hive is what 

 we would call here a double decker, two 

 bodies, one on top of the other. The 

 transposition consists in changing the 

 place of the two bodies, putting the 

 lower one on the top. The queen 

 starts then anew, in what is now the 

 lower story. This prevents swarming 

 eflfectually. It will be perceived that this 

 method applies exclusively to raising 

 extracted honey. 



4th. — Reclusion. That's what we 

 would call Lere "contraction." The 

 queen is confined on two combs only by 

 means of a perforated zinc partition. 

 The honey which would have been used 

 for a large amount of brood is saved, 

 and a number of what we would call 

 here "useless consumers" are also saved 

 or rather the honey they would have 

 consumed. 



5th.— Fall feeding. Later in the sea- 

 son, sugar feeding is resorted to for 

 several reasons. It is cheaper than 

 honey, therefore it pays to extract en- 

 tirely and feed sugar in the place. I" 

 order to build up fast, in the spring it 

 is necessary that the colonv should hav'e 

 an abundant store of provisions. But 

 Mr. Preuss goes farther than that. He 

 feeds earlv in the fall, so plenty of 

 young bees are raised, and his colonfes 

 are at the opening of the season, strong 

 in young bees and provisions. 



By the us.e of this method. Mr. Preuss 

 has obtained far greater yields of honey 

 than by the ordinary management. 



The only two points that can be con- 

 sidered new for the American readers, 

 are the use of the consignator and the 

 fall feeding, or rather the fall breeding 

 of young bees. I cannot say much on 

 the first point, but I can say something 

 on the second. With me. the colonies 

 that are strong in bees, or rather in 

 young bees in/<he fall, are those that 

 winter well, breed fast in the following 

 spring, and give the big surplus. It may 

 be a question of locality, and possibly 

 of oroper management. Many of our 

 leading writers, Doolittle, Hutchinson, 

 etc., advise letting down breeding dur- 

 ing and after the honey How and hav- 



ing in each colony, only the necessary 

 number of bees to keep alive through 

 the winter and then build up in the 

 spring as fast as possible. 



In a discussion on the question of 

 large versus small brood nests that 

 took place some two or three years 

 ago, I asked them something like this: 

 "Do j'ou not lose more than you gain 

 by discouraging brood rearing? You 

 barely succeed in getting bees and 

 brood enough to fill an eight-frame 

 hive in time for the honey flow. Start- 

 ing in the spring with a stronger colony, 

 could you not just as well; and, in fact, 

 more easily fill a Dadant hive (about 

 12 frames standard size) and have some- 

 thing like twice the number of field 

 workers at the opening of the flow?" 



To this, Hutchinson replied that the 

 very strong colonies do not winter well 

 in cellars. They get restless, raise 

 brood, eat pollen, contract the dysen- 

 tery, and come out in the spring in a 

 bad fix, if they don't die out entirely. 



Well, I didn't have much to say in re- 

 ply, having no experience in cellar win- 

 tering. I suggested, however, that the 

 temperature which was just right for 

 the small colonies might be too high 

 for the large ones, because the heat pro- 

 duced by the bees was added to that of 

 the cellar, and since the large colonies 

 produce more heat, the cellar ought to 

 be kept colder m order to make com- 

 pensation. 



Knoxville. Tenn.. May 20, 1902. 



Bees and Nature Study. 



(Bessie L. Putnam.) 



THE WINTER vacation of the 

 northern apairist, though one of 

 enforced physical inactivity, may 

 be a rich mental feast. The practical 

 bee-keeper is. whether or not he him- 

 self realizes the fact, considerable of a 

 naturalist. He can at once pick out a 

 queen or queen cell; he knows just 

 how many daj's after a swarm emerge? 

 before the second swarm may be ex- 

 pected; the '^asturage. periods of great- 

 est activity, methods of work, enemies, 

 all these phases and many more are 

 familiar to him. Yet if his observation 

 ends with that which seems to promise 

 pecuniary benefit, the greatest charm in 

 b«e-keeping is lost. 



It IS noteworthy that many passion- 



