1871.] 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



85 



go to two or three other colonies and take two 

 combs from each of them, setting them in the 

 new hive, with the frames first removed. Do 

 this in the evening, or, if you separate in the 

 morning, always set them in a dark cellar till 

 late in the evening, and then let them out. 

 When you go to unite the frames always blow 

 smoke on them for a short time, and the bees 

 will unite with distressing each other. 



I can take out a frame or two of brood once in 

 awhile, and thereby control the swarming in al- 

 most all cases, and have my bees store honey 

 during the whole of the honey season. And by 

 taking out the frames from the center of the 

 hive, the bees are not stopped from storing 

 honey, but are rather incited to labor the 

 harder. 



When you let a hive swarm naturally you 

 nearly destroy the honey storing of the colony 

 for that season. But by controlling swarming 

 you will never stop the storing of honey, checking 

 it very little indeed, while you add one-fourth or 

 one-third to the number of your stock, and have 

 all good strong colonies in the fall. By taking 

 their old brood combs from the old hives at that 

 season of the year, the colony will in almost all 

 cases bujld new worker combs ; and by getting 

 the new in the center of the hives, your old 

 stocks vvnll be much healthier and more vigorous. 

 Always notice if you have a last year's swarm 

 equally strong with an old colony in the spring, 

 that the former will generally be first to swarm. 



I see by the Journal that the ladies are taking 

 some interest in the cultivation of bees. When 

 you see the ladies take hold of a business like 

 this, they generally do it in the right way and 

 succeed well. 



I have got up a new hive, atid am almost afraid 

 to say anything about it in the Journal, for I see 

 in the August number that friend Gallup, hav- 

 ing slipped in a few words concerning his hive 

 in the previous number, gets a rap on the 

 knuckles on every side. Now, if he had got it 

 patented, made a great blow about it, got out a 

 boasting advertisement and a flaming show bill, 

 and charged five or ten dollars for a right and a 

 description, it would all have gone off ra^jidly, 

 like hot buckwheat cakes in the fall, spread 

 with plenty of butter and honey. 



Alfred Chapman. 



New Cumberland, West Va., Aug. 21, 1871. 



[For the American Bee Journal.] 



Facts on Queen Eaising, 



Mr. Editor:— I see in the July niimber of the 

 Journal IVIr. J. L. McLean, of Richmond, Ohio, 

 undertakes to philosphize away the longevity 

 and fertility of artificial queens, on the ground 

 that the length of life in "a being is in the ratio of 

 the time intervening between birth and puberty." 



We understand from the article the birth of 

 the bee to be fixed at the period of the hatching 

 of Ihe eg^, and not when it emerges from the cell. 



l^will here pause, and inquire whether or not 

 Mr. McL. is not laboring under a mistake, when 

 he takes the position, that the iDeriod intervening 



between birth and puberty is shorter in the case 

 of an artificial queen, than in that of a natural 

 one? 



1. The birth of the bee is fixed at the hatch- 

 ing of the egg. 



3. All larvae, whether in worker or royal 

 cells, are fed on the same kind of food during 

 the first five days. 



3. On condition that the royal cell is built the 

 third day after birth, so that the queen emerges 

 from the cell in ten or eleven days from the 

 time the cell is started, is the period between 

 birth and puberty of the queen shortened? I 

 think not. She only lived and was fed in a 

 worker cell as she would have lived and been 

 fed in a royal cell for the first three days ; but 

 the length of time from birth to puberty is the 

 same. 



The dimensions of the cell do not always 

 determine the size of the queen reared therein ; 

 but is indicative of the amount of food placed 

 in the cell. 



When queens are reared under the impulse of 

 natural swarming, the largest cells are filled one 

 half inch in the bottom with food, and the cell 

 lengthened out to give the queen the proper 

 amount of room; and after the cell is vacated a 

 large proportion of the food is left behind un- 

 consumed. But the food consumed and not 

 that which is left, has to do with the life of 

 the queen. 



Do artificial queens get a sufficient amount of 

 food? Under most circumstances they do. 

 Tins is demonstrated in the size, color, health, 

 and their early fertility. When manipulation is 

 correct, such queens are as large, as bright colored, 

 go upon their bridal trip as early, and commence 

 depositing eggs as soon after copulation as 

 natural queens. Does the circumstance of the 

 inother depositing the eg<^ in the royal cell 

 and its hatching there, give the embryo queen 

 an advantage over the one worker deposited and 

 hatched in a worker cell, on condition that it is 

 nursed for a queen from birth ? I think not. No 

 food is put in the worker or royal cell until the 

 ess hatches, and then the same kind is given for 

 five days, though not always, I think, the same 

 in quantity. Hence the importance of having 

 the larva fed in view of a queen from birth, but 

 not from the depositing of the egg — as this 

 always, both in a worker and royal cell, remains 

 without food till birth. A. Salisbury. 



Camargo, 111. 



It is yet an unsettled point whether the queen 

 ever deposits an CfjEC in a royal cell. We put the 

 question to Mr. Dzierzon some years ago, and his 

 reply was that though he had opened and inspected 

 thousands of hives in the breeding season, and 

 watched queens when laying in worker aud in drone 

 cells, he had never seen one laying in a royal cell. 

 He called the attention of beekeepers to the matter, in 

 the Bieuenzeitung, and asked whether any one had 

 seen the queen in the act of laying in such cells ; but 

 no one has ever answered affirmatively. Has any 

 American beekeeper seen it? — Our own impression is 

 that she does so, but only when the mouth of the cell 

 has been properly prepared for the purpose by the 

 workers. — [Ed. 



