W AMERICAN 



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Apiculturist. 



A Journal Devoted, to Fractica.1 Beekeeping. 



VOL. IX. 



OCTOBER, 1891. 



No. 10. 



AN INTERIiSTING LETTER ON 

 INTRODUCING QUEENS. 



F. O. Br.AiR. 



Fkif.nd Alley : Permit me to thank 

 you for giving so much time and space 

 in the Api to discussing the best meth- 

 ods of introducing queens. My efforts 

 in the way of beekeeping have come 

 nearer to failure in introducing queens 

 than in any other process of manipula- 

 tion. I have supposed that my want of 

 success had been largely due to my 

 clumsiness or awkwardness or want of 

 care ; but if such an experienced apia- 

 rist as A. I. Root loses 25 per cent of 

 queens in the process of introduction, 

 as- he himself confesses, my case is not 

 altogether hopeless. 



It is exceedingly annoying and not a 

 little vexatious, when you have paid a 

 high price for a choice queen, to have 

 the bees, when you undertake to intro- 

 duce her to them, consider her of so 

 little consequence that they kill her out- 

 right, hug her to death out of pure 

 affection. 



By the way, I now see that I wns on 

 the very verge of an important discovery 

 nearly a quarter of a century ago. It 

 was in the early days of the Italians, 

 and I paid $20 for a very rare queen. 

 Of course, I was very anxious to intro- 

 duce her safely, and disposed to take 

 all possible care to avoid failure. 



I removed the queen from a fine 

 strong colony, waited till all the brood 

 was too mature for them to start a 

 queen- cell, carefully cut all the queen- 

 cells out which had been begun, and 



then caged her majesty and placed the 

 cage for several days between the frames 

 for mutual conference and acquaintance. 

 When I was ready to let her loose, in 

 order to make it absolutely certain that 

 no queen cell had been overlooked, 

 with tobacco smoke I drove all the bees 

 off the combs into the bottom of the 

 hive, and gave the whole a careful re- 

 examination. I then let the precious 

 madam run down into the hive, still 

 reeking with the fumes of tobacco. 

 That introduction was a splendid suc- 

 cess ; and since reading your experience 

 I have no doubt the tobacco smoke 

 largely contributed. Could T have put 

 this and that together, I, too, might per- 

 haps have learned how to introduce 

 queens with tobacco smoke. I am as 

 much opposed to the use of tobacco 

 for myself as A. I. Root is, but I know 

 it is good in handling bees. 



The new ideas I have gained by read- 

 ing in the Api, the best methods of in- 

 troducing queens, will be of great value 

 to me in the future, I surely believe, and 

 I expect to have much better success 

 in days to come. 



Trinidad^ Colorado. 



The first queens we ever introduced 

 were treated exactly as the method given 

 in the Sept. Api. We are using the 

 same pattern fumigator (no improve- 

 ment in it) that was used in our apiary 

 some thirty years ago. It is impossible 

 to lose a queen by that method. At 

 any rate, when directions are followed, 

 we are ready to guarantee safe introduc- 

 tion of all Punic queens we send out. — 

 Ed.] 



C135) 



