THE AMERICAN APICULTUIUST, 



131 



Cook) I advise all to wait and see wlu'ther 

 I am a Calse prophet or not. I suji.iit'f.toil 

 tliat, the time was not far distant when 

 bees woukl bf wintered on tlr\' sunar. It 

 will he (.lone. Jn.st have patience antl some 

 of the sl( epy peojiie, .so much l)ehiiid the 

 times, will wake up one of these morn- 

 inirs and lind I am correct. 



To return to the question. Who of onr 

 enterprisin-i beekeepers are ready to aid 

 Mr. Smith in his experiment.s to convert 

 honey into sniiar? Is not the experiment 

 wortii testiui;':' Will the bee conventions 

 take holit of this matter? Space will not 

 allow, at this tim<', more to be said on the 

 subject, but I will refer to it again later 

 ou. 



Remarks about Transferring. 

 Very few beekeepers can do a nice and 

 neat job at traiislerring. Most of tho.se 

 who do such work j;et their ideas Irom 

 some work upon bee culture written years 

 a.i:() by inexperienced authors. Below is an 

 illustration of the bunjiling manner in 

 Avhich some people do the work of trans- 

 ferring or placing brood or other cond) iu 







>t^V-J fe 



''^r-%— =^^^ te ff^ 



Tran.sferreil combs. 



it in 

 with 



frames. The tiiethod of fastening 

 the frame is also shown. 



The sticks, bound at the ends 

 twine, thoroughly represent and put the 

 finish upon a bungling piece of work of 

 transferring. Ought not any person to 

 know, who has had any experience with 

 bees, that all the brood tlirectly under 

 those sticks will be destroyed? Even if 

 the young bees were ready to emerge from 

 the cells, they could not do so, as there is 

 no way they could extricate themselves 

 from such a position. Well, uovv instead 

 of placing those ill-shaped pieces of comb 

 in the frames, why not take a sharp, thin 

 knife and straighten the edges of each 

 piece so that they will go squai-ely to- 

 gether, thus lining the frame siAid full of 

 comb. Don't use sticks for fasti-ning the 

 comb in the frame ; throw such, also pieces 

 of tin, to the dogs. liead some of the back 

 numbers of the An and you will learu 

 just how to transfer. 



The proper time to transfer is about 

 May 20, or as soon as the bees begin to 



gather honey. Some cloudy day is a good 

 time fordoing the work, provided it is not 

 too cool ; though the bees are taken to a 

 warm room to transfer, yet the weatlu'r 

 slioidd be so warm that the bees that lly 

 to the windows during the operation can 

 return to the hive when it is placed on 

 the stajid. 



There is another advantage in doing 

 such work upon a cloudy day; the bees 

 are all at home and there is no time lost 

 to them in gathering honey and pollen. 



The Drone-and-Queen Trap. 



Last year I placed several of the traps 

 on some hives in which there were very 

 full colonies. In passing through the 

 yard a little later I found large numbers 

 of the bees clustered outside of the hive 

 and about the trnp. This state of things 

 indicated that something was wrong and 

 an investigation was at once made; the 



bees were 

 brushed off 

 carefully so 

 as not to dis- 

 P.ottom of clione-trai), turb the trap. 



I then found that the back edge of the 

 bottom piece of tl)e trap had nearly closed 

 the entrance to theliive; as, when the trap 

 was plnced in position, there happened to 

 be a liitle dirt on the alighting-board, 

 (some scales of wax and pollen which the 

 bees had brought out and the sun had 

 melted), thus securely fastening it to the 

 dirt-board. The trap was removed and the 

 wood was removed the same as illustrated 

 iu the accompanying cut. The traps were 

 replaced anil the bees soon returned to 

 the hive and went to work. 



There is one other difficulty tliat some 

 may experience with the trap. The aper- 

 ture in the cone tube should be larger than 

 it is in some of the traps first sent out. 

 The hole may be safely enlarged to three- 

 eighths or one-half an inch. Before plac- 

 ing the trap on the hive, examine it and 

 see that it is in order. 



Cappedbrood and cell-building. 



1. What is the objection, if any, to hav- 

 ing capped brood in a cell-buildiug col- 

 ony ? 



2. AVill a colony that has been queenless 

 a long time build as good queen cells as a 

 colony just deprived of its queen, provid- 

 ed the former be supplied with pleuty of 



