116 



THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



is the condition of the old one? 

 You will find eight frames of brood 

 in all stages and young bees enough 

 to care for the eggs and larvae, and 

 hundreds more hatching every day. 

 Let them stand six or seven days ; 

 then open the hive and cut all queen 

 cells saving the best to be placed in 

 the nuclei from which you are to take 

 a laying queen and place in the old 

 hive and you have a swarm that will 

 often fill one and two sets of sections 

 during the basswood flow.' After 

 much experimenting, I find this al- 

 lows the bees a chance to be true to 

 nature, and still we practically con- 

 trol the swarming. Now we are 

 within a few days of the basswood 

 bloom and we must make everything 

 count. Hive the swarm on the old 

 stand as before, but do not carry the 

 old hive to a new stand but place it 

 beside the new swarm with entrance 

 at right angles. Let this stand eight 

 days. Towards night of the eighth 

 day, open the old hive and you will 

 find that you have a fair swarm of 

 bees. Have your comb box ready, 

 remove the combs, shake the bees at 

 the entrance of the new hive, place 

 the combs in the box, shake some of 

 the bees from the old hive and re- 

 move to a new stand, and place the 

 combs in the hive, cutting out all 

 queen cells but one, or all if you have 

 a young queen that you can give 

 them. Now the young bees and what 

 are yet to hatch will take care of the 

 work in the hive, and with care will 

 be in trim to take the last of bass- 

 wood and store dark honey enough 

 to winter upon. From the first 

 swarms you will get more honey than 

 you would had you tried to keep 

 them in one hive by hiving, and re- 

 turning to the old hive, and trying 

 to suppress the swarming impulse. 

 Second you get the greater part of 

 the worker bees when they will do 

 the most good during the honey flow. 

 And with the above management you 

 have doubled the number of colo- 



nies that have cast a swarm. Now, 

 brother beekeepers, what I have said 

 comes from practical experience, and 

 if any one has gained a new thought 

 then I have accomplished what I 

 hoped I might. 



Allow me to discard the subject as 

 given, and ask you to accept this as 

 one of the best managements of the 

 apiary for comb honey. 



Mr. King believed that the remov- 

 ing honey as fast as capped and to 

 replace them with those that are but 

 partially filled is the proper way to 

 secure the largest amount of surplus 

 honey. 



This system did not discourage 

 the bees but was in exact accordance 

 with the nature of the little insect. 

 Mr. Locke spoke in favor of the sys- 

 tem and said it was that practised by 

 the ancient Germans who kept at 

 times a thousand colonies. 



CIRCULARS AND PAMPHLETS. 



The committee on circulars and 

 pamphlets reported through Mr. 

 Locke, and in motion the committee 

 was continued another year. 



THE REVERSIBLE FRAME. 



The secretary read an article by 

 Mr.lTefft on the "Reversible Frame." 

 The article declared the invention 

 a great improvement over the old 

 hanging frame and it was very uni- 

 versally adopted by the most intelli- 

 gent apiarists. 



The article also referred to the ob- 

 jects to be gained by use of this 

 style of frame. 



Messrs. King, Betsinger, Root, 

 Clark, Locke, Benedict, Doolittle and 

 others, took part in the discussion, 

 and it was generally admitted that at 

 certain times in the season and with 

 judicious management the reversible 

 frame would prove a success. 



Some of the objections offered 

 were that if care were not taken, poor 

 honey would be carried in the surplus 

 boxes, thus injuring the quality of the 



