396 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



colonies that will prepare to swarm 

 every week for four or five weeks in 

 succession, and then give it up; while, 

 occasionally, one will attempt repeat- 

 edly to swarm, and nothing- but the en- 

 trance-guard will keep it. Such a 

 colony will kill its queen, if she does 

 not get caught in the trap, and I let 

 it stay queenless for ten daj's. 

 Those behaving this way are onl3' a 

 very small per cent, and after this 

 they do very fair work in the supers. 

 If, however, they cease working, I 

 break up the colony and make it into 

 nuclei. I aim to make every colony 

 accomplish something towards carrying 

 on the business. After every colony 

 has been examined and treated accord- 

 ing to its needs, (and very much must 

 depend upon the judgment of the oper- 

 ator) I lock up the house and leave 

 them far one week. 



MANAGEMElNTT THAT REQUIRES A VISIT 

 ONLY ONCE A WEEK. 



On the next visit, one week later, I 

 look each colony over for queen cells. 

 Those just started, and partly along, 

 are destroyed. If the colony is very 

 populous, one or two frames of brood 

 are taken, and empty combs put in 

 their places, or, more properly, in the 

 center of the brood nest. If I can 

 strengthen any weaker colonies ad- 

 vantageously, I do so, otherwise I keep 

 taking out hatching brood, as I look 

 the colonies over, until all are exam- 

 ined, then I form colonies by taking 

 six frames of hatching brood and put- 

 ting them into an empty hive, giving 

 them a new shelf, and shutting 

 them up until the next visit. If a 

 colony is bound and determined to 

 swarm, I sometimes shake them; but I 

 can get more honey bj' taking away 

 just enough brood to control the colony, 

 and do not shake unless the colony be- 

 comes uncontrollable. I have never 

 been able to make shook swarming a 

 success. The bees do not seem to 

 have any vim. I should have said su- 



pers are added at this time to those 

 colonies needing them. At the next 

 visit all colonies formed at the preceed- 

 ing visit have their entrances opened, 

 and each should contain a virgin queen 

 hatched from a cell given at the time 

 of forming. At each weekly visit here- 

 after I treat the colonies same as at the 

 second visit, putting on sections as 

 fast as needed and taking them off 

 when finished. 



During the forepart of the season, 

 and until there are signs of the flow 

 slackening, I put the new supers under 

 the others, but, as the end draws near, 

 I put them on top. 



At the closing of the white harvest I 

 take off all the sections, expand each 

 brood-nest by inserting one, two or 

 three empty combs. Look to the 

 queens; if any are old or failing, pinch 

 their heads oft' and introduce others 

 reared at home; for the mating of queens 

 in a house-apiary is its greatest draw- 

 back. There are too many lost. This 

 does not bother me, as I prefer to rear 

 them at home from selected stock. 



Then there was another knotty prob- 

 lem which has bothered me, and 

 others, also. That is, stocks that have 

 been queenless sometime. If we try to 

 give such a stock a laying queen by 

 the ordinary method, she is almost 

 sure to be killed. I struck on a plan 

 this summer that has not failed me yet. 

 If it can be spared I like to have a 

 frame of hatching brood to give the 

 queenless stock, at the same time put- 

 ting in the laying queen, but have the 

 queen cage fixed so the bees cannot re- 

 lease the queen. I leave thus for a 

 week, and then the bees get so they 

 will beg for her. Then I allow them 

 to release her, which method has been 

 successsul so far. If more increase is 

 desired, the most populous colonies can 

 be divided, having extra queens to give 

 the queenless parts at the time, or 

 soon after the operation. 



The zinc slides in the drone trap 

 are removed as soon as we can safely 



