March 1, 1906 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



187 



been found dishonest in this country. I am going to s., that 

 2 of them were women. 



The late Samuel Wagner— the pioneer of bee-joun. 

 once said to me that a man attacked about the same as \ r. 

 Smith attacks certain queen-breeders, loses nothing as the 

 careful reader can see that there is something back oi it. It 

 any one desires to attack me. by all means give in- 

 \\\ I ask i- give me a chance to show ray side ot the qu 

 i put ui) no jol - to cheat any one. I work 18 hours a 

 the queen-rearing season to fill all orders promptly. I 



clear conscience, even if I cannot lake care of all orders sent 

 me I am human, and shall continue to make mistakes, but J 

 think 99 per cent of all my customers are well satisfied with 

 the treatment they receive from me. 



4— Dadant Methods of Honey-Production 



BY C. P. DADANT. 



I SAID, m a previous article, that after a disastrous winter, 

 we soon recuperated from our losses, owing to the large 

 number of empty combs that we had to use. Some of my 

 readers, however, may have read in "Advanced Bee-culture," 

 by W. Z. Hutchinson, that in his experience with swarms 

 hived upon drawn combs, "the loss has always been so great 

 that it seems like folly to repeat it." This would apparently 

 contradict my experience, but it does not, in fact. It has never 

 been our method to depend upon natural swarming for in- 

 crease, so that we do not usually practice hiving swarms upon 

 drawn combs. But let us see how it is possible that swarms 

 hived upon drawn combs may lose by it. 



When the bees swarm, the honey crop is usually at its 

 best or at least opening. As soon as the bees are hived, if 

 they are supplied with full-built combs from colonies that have 

 died, they at once unload their honey-sacs and start for the 

 fields, and within two or three days — sometimes less — the 

 combs are all filled with fresh honey. They may not be filled 

 to overflowing, but as the honey is thin and watery when 

 freshly harvested, the bees scatter it all over the hive and put 

 some in almost every cell. The result is an entire lack of 

 room for the queen to lay. and the colony soon dwindles, 

 unless the honey has been extracted. Should the season stop 

 suddenly, the queen will find room to lay, but in a locality 

 where there may be no second crop, perhaps too many bees 

 are reared at once which will find no occupation and will only 

 help consume the stores before winter. 



Our method is to make our increase artificially, as we 

 then can get all the advantage there is in the saving of comb- 

 building. Besides, there is a much more important point, and 

 that is, we have noticed that the strongest colonies — those that 

 are most likely to furnish increase in natural circumstances — 

 are also the ones which will produce the most honey; while 

 the weaker ones will rear bees a little late for the crop, and 

 will be only fit for increase; but if they are left to their own 

 devices, they will not swarm, and the result will be either no 

 swarms or a decreased production of honey. But if we can 

 make things' comfortable enough for our best colonies, so that 

 they will not get the swarming fever, except in rare instances; 

 and if we manage to divide our poorer colonies, which are 

 just becoming strong near the end of the crop, we will get 

 both increase and honey. 



But when we make our increase from the poorer colonies 

 (mind, I do not say the poorest ones), we must be sure not 

 to rear our queens from them, for we would fail in the most 

 important matter. The queens must be reared from our best 

 breeders, and supplied to divisions made from such colonies 

 as will not be likely to produce a surplus crop. But we aim 

 to keep whole our best colonies, for it is from them that the 

 harvest is to come. 



When the young queens are laying, they are supplied 

 judiciously, from time to time, with combs already built 

 secured from dead colonies, if we have them, or, with comb 

 foundation, if no already built combs are found on hand 

 and we have thus secured the very best results; for it is only 

 the strongest colonies, supplied with a great field harvest, that 

 can build comb to any advantage, and this is always done at 

 great cost, in honey, for it takes them fully as long to build 

 the combs as it would take to fill them, if they were given to 

 them already built. 



Artificial divisions or increase are made in a number of 

 different ways, and this is left to the judgment of the apiarist, 

 but the young queens must be reared from the best stock at 

 as low a cost as possible, and furnished to the bees so as to 

 have as little loss of time as possible, if we want to secure the 



neatest results. One swarm or division maybe made from 



onies by taking br 1 from the one and bees from the 



Xr or a colony may be split into three or .our pieces and 



each separat di< helped bj placing tt on the tand oi 



anlthlr colony. During a g 1 hqney-fTow, we can manipu- 



I a r bee and mix them n» many ways, for although they 

 flv realize that strangers are introduced into their home, 



Aose^rWers never come empty handed if the crop is 



*d thej are as welcome among them as a strange, 

 comes among men with a gift or offer to pay hts w 



We not only secure a larger crop o honej n w< take 

 the greater part of our increase from colonies which would 

 -heru.se produce no surplus, bu1 we do away with the un- 

 certain vof the expectation of increase by swarming. have 

 of I card apiarists express their disappointment athaymg 

 had no natural swarms I ™ disappointment m tins 



| . the crop has been an entire failure, tor an absence of 

 Sal swarms is what I want. If 1 want increase it can 

 always be produced, especially if there are plenty ... built 



Tlf theXtsions, made from colonies that are under aver- 

 age with breeders from the best stock, should prove to be 

 fnsuffiriently strong towards the end ot the honey crop, they 

 may be easfly helped out with combs of brood and honey from 

 the colonies' that have produced a surplus, and such help, 

 taken towards the end of the crop, will not perceptibly weaken 

 he strong colon.es, and will yet help the increase enough to 

 make good colonies of them before the winter comes. 



In all these matters, some knowledge of the conditions 

 of the annual crop are necessary, and one must be guided to 

 a great extent by the prospects and appearances of the honey 

 crop But we should bear m mind what I think is very im- 

 portant that a colony that may not be sufficiently populous 

 to fill its supers, will easily produce bees enough to build up 

 an additional colony, if queen and combs are supplied as 

 the queen and the combs are the most expensive parts of the 

 colony's resources. Much of our success depends upon due 

 consideration of this matter. Hamilton, 111. 



Clipping and Filing Apiarian Oddities 



BY W. A. PRYAL. 



DID vou ever know that a modern newspaper— the yellow 

 kind, if you will— has a clipping and filing department 

 that gathers all the items and articles concerning the 

 various walks of life-all the biographies of men of any im- 

 portance even in remote villages of our country, all the in- 

 ventions discoveries, all the freak happenings of man or 

 beast and-well, everything that may be used for an article 

 sooner or later with what pictures that may be obtained 

 bearing on the same-and files them away under a vvell- 

 arra./ed index system? All that is interesting about bee, 

 and all that are jokes, even to the lies that crop up from time 

 to time (for the filing department is not supposed to have an 

 editor who knows everything), are hied under the general 

 head of "Bees." When a racy article with suitable art 

 embellishments is demanded by the ed.tonal manager the 

 "Clipping Encyclopedia," if I may so name it, is brought forth 

 and the reporter's "stew-pan" evolves an 'interesting (sic!) 

 article on the bee. The Encyclopedia Bntanmca or the Cen- 

 tury or not even one of the numerous up-to-date bee-books 

 is consulted for authoritative lore on the little honey-gatherer 

 Then is it any wonder that we have such a hodge-podge lot • 

 of information thrown pell-mell at the public now and then? 

 I have been led to make these remarks by several telegraphic 

 news items I have seen in the daily papers of San Francisco 

 during the past month. . . 



I have been something of a clipping establishment my- 

 self—finger-nails have oftener received my attention in this 

 direction than anything else. Queens' wings used to be a 

 fascinating source of amusement for my proclivities a few- 

 years back, and it was a delicate operation, yet I remember 

 "that once or twice in my hustle 1 took off the royalty's ground 

 propeller instead of her fairy air-movers. It was cruel, and it 

 just pained me when the mishap occurred. It was almost as 

 bad as if a dentist pulled off a man's leg when he intended 

 to yank out an aching molar. But I am drifting from what 

 I was going to write about. 



This has been a "freak" year in California. \\ e have bad 

 "freak" weather and we have been treated to "freak- crops. 

 But then there is no place like California for all that. Mo 

 sun-strokes, no one frozen to death, no thunder-storms, and 

 seldom any lightning to peal of. Among the things I nave 

 seen in the papers the past month was one where a bee-keeper 



