THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER. 



April, 



tions by its being carried up from the 

 combs below. But I shall try hard 

 to get in the "millions of honey at 

 our house" part of the plan. 



Through May I shall simply let 

 the bees build up to what strength 

 they can, supplying a second story 

 only to such colonies as show unus- 

 ual strength. During the latter part 

 of May and the early part of June I 

 shall raise the brood nest and put 

 frames of comb or foundation below 

 placing also one frame of brood be- 

 low. After the queen is well estab- 

 lished below I shall shut her there 

 by excluder, possibly about the mid- 

 dle of June. Thus I expect to cause 

 the filling of the combs above with 

 the black product gathered in June. 

 In case insufficient room results 1 

 shall exchange combs or possibly 

 supply case of sections to the strong- 

 er colonies. 



My expectation is that the bees will 

 with this treatment swarm little or 

 none at all, and by the loth of July 

 the hives should be roaring full of' 

 bees. At that time or earlier pro- 

 vided there is any show of white hon- 

 ey I shall place case of sections be- 

 tween the two stories. By the time 

 this case is well along I expect the 

 sumac flow to be well started. I 

 shall then remove all the upper sto- 

 ries of combs full of the dark honey 

 and shall tier them above a few weak- 

 er colonies or nuclei. A^ the same 

 . time I shall put two cases of sections 

 on every colony that can care for 

 that number. From then on through 

 July I shall push the colonies as hard 

 as possible, avoiding an excess of 

 room as the sumac season wanes. 



I trust by this method to cauc; 

 more of the dark honey of June to 

 be turned into bees for the white hon- 

 ey harvest. If necessary in any case 

 1 shall requeen in order to ke^p 

 brood rearing at its height through 

 June. If successful this method will 

 avoid all sections of dark honey and 



should double or treble the amount of 

 white honey. 



During the last week of July I shall 

 remove all supers of sections as I am 

 absolutely certain that they will gain 

 nothing but propolis by remaining 

 and may lose much of their value. 1 

 shall at the same time replace the 

 stories containing the dark honey. 

 Thus during August, a month when 

 bees in this locality do but little brood 

 rearing, the bees will have a store of 

 forty to fifty pounds of honey above 

 the brood nest and will keep up the 

 strength of the colonies so that they 

 will be fit for the September harvest 

 of white honey, a crop better for win- 

 tering than the June honey and migh- 

 ty good for one's own eating. 



Thus is the plan briefly outlined, 

 I may find it necessary to modify it 

 here and there, and there is much 

 uncertainty as to whether the re- 

 placed story of honey should go above 

 or below, and much uncertainty as 

 to when excluders should be on and 

 when off. These matters can only 

 be settled by trial. I expect there- 

 fore to run a score or more of colo- 

 nies one way and a score or more 

 the other way whenever the roads 

 seem to fork. The results will then 

 tell me which way to adopt. 



It may call for re-queening in early 

 August in order to be certain of the 

 dark honey of June being turned into 

 workers. At any rate I shall make a 

 bold attempt to have the extra frames 

 come out in the fall empty of any- 

 thing but dark honey, and shall hope 

 to avoid all feeding of sugar, making 

 this otherwise almost unprofitable 

 flow of June turn into a blessing. 



Norwich, Conn. 



The American Bee-Keeper Three 

 Full Years $i.oo. To New Subscrib- 

 ers, Three Full Years for Ninety 

 Cents. Is that Cheap Enough? 



