Published Monthly by The W. T. Falconer Mfg. Co. 



QUEEN-REARING NUMBER 



Vol. X 



DECEMBER, 1900 



No. 12 



CONFINING BEES FOR CELL- 

 BUILDING. 



Experiences and Suggestions from tlie 

 Originator of the Plan. 



Uy W. H. PRIDGBV. 



REPORTS in the different .lournals 

 go to show that but few bee- 

 keepers are suflicientiy expert in 

 imitating natural cells regardless of the 

 method employed in the preparation of 

 the larvae to meet with uniform success 

 in having them accepted, unless a more 

 intense desire for a queen is brought to 

 l)(!ar than exists under the natural im- 

 pulse, or conditions that give the most 

 satisfactory results in cell-building. 

 Immediate acceptance is essential to 

 the production of first-class queens; as 

 a larva once neglected is slower in de- 

 xclopment, and never results in such, 

 lifaiizing this fact, like many others, 

 the writer had to adopt some plan of 

 overcoming the reluctance on the part 

 of the bees in receiving promptly the 

 larvae given, and first gave them to bees 

 made broodless and queenless, by tak- 

 ing away the queen and a day or two 

 later, the brood, as recommended by 

 (itlKU's. This proved to be too slow, and 

 linally the bi'ood and queen were both 

 taken away at once, with the result 

 tiiat the bees had to be confined to pre- 

 vent desertion, by placing a screen at 

 (lie entrance of tiie hive, tiiat turned all 



in and none out. Three cr four hours 

 Iat(;r prepared cups were given and all 

 were pi'omptly accepted. 



Inasmuch as confined bees would ac- 

 cept the cups, all that was ?jecessary 

 was to shake the bees from several combs 

 of a normal colony into a hive contain- 

 ing combs of honey and pollen and 

 provided with a wire-screen bottom as 

 a ventilator, was the manner of reason- 

 ing which was put into practice with 

 satisfactory results as to the acceptance 

 and shaping up of the cups, but was 

 rather fussy and slow, in that the queen 

 had to be found to avoid shaking her off 

 into the hive with the cell-starters and 

 the bees had to be shaken or brushed 

 from the combs into their liive after the 

 cups were worked on a few hours and 

 given to other bees to be completed. 

 The next step was to use the cell- 

 builders over an excluder, after all ol 

 the brood in the upper storj' was sealed, 

 by simply placing the upper story on a 

 stand with wire-cloth bottom and shak- 

 ing the bees from a few of the combs to 

 cause the excitement that follows I'ongh 

 handling, in search of the queen, and 

 found that such bees would accept almost 

 any number of cups in from four to six 

 hours, and could be placed back over 

 the excluder to complete them. Now a 

 colony is kept for this part of the work 

 with two stories above the excluder, 

 with a laying queeti below: and whiit> 



