752 



Sept. 6, 1906 



American Ttee Journal 



for advertisements for a year, but have 

 failed to see it advertised. I think 

 sweet clover would be a great help to 

 us, as our bees are always idle after 

 white clover is gone, for quite awhile. 

 We had a very good honey season 

 through the white clover harvest, but I 

 am afraid the drouth of July will hurt 

 the sumac yield, which is now in 

 bloom. It is next to white clover for 

 fine honey in this locality. We have 9 

 colonies of bees, and I have done all 

 the work with them myself. 



I always enjoy reading the American 

 Bee Journal, especially the Sisters' 

 department. Mrs. Otto Hotze. 



Monroe Co., Ind. 



We have no seed for sale. Turn to 

 page 627 and you will find an advertise- 

 ment of yellow sweet crover seed for 

 sale by one of the sisters — Mrs. A. L. 

 Amos. Whether she has white sweet 

 clover seed or not I do not know. Ad- 

 vertisements of the kind seem more 

 scarce than usual this year, and the 

 seed is said to be more scarce. 



The yellow sweet clover blooms from 

 2 to 4 weeks earlier than the white. 

 The white sweet clover is generally of 

 more value where white clover abounds, 

 as it comes in at the close of the white 

 clover harvest ; but in some places 

 where there is no white clover to speak 

 of, as in the locality of Mrs. Amos, the 

 yellow is of more importance. We 

 have been in the habit of thinking that 

 we didn't care anything for the yellow 

 kind, but th's yeir, when the common 

 white clover was a dead failure, it 

 would have been a big thing for us if 

 we had had the yellow sweet clover. — 

 [If any one has sweet clover seed to 

 sell, it would seem a good thing to 

 offer it in the advertising columns. — 

 Editor ] 



Uniting Colonies— Sowing Sweet 

 Clover — Queen -Traps 



1. I have a few colonies of bees which 

 I do not wish to keep over winter. The 

 comb is old, black, and almost or quite 

 immovable from long neglect ; and yet 

 it seems a pity to destroy the bees. 

 Can I unite them with other colonies ? 

 If it can be done, please givedirections 

 very plainly so that an amateur will 

 have no trouble in understanding. 



2. I wish to sow a small patch of 

 sweet clover. Should it be sown in the 

 spring or fall? If the former, will it 

 blossom the same season ? 



3. Is the "A B C of Bee Culture" 

 suitable for a beginner ? I have 3 or 4 

 years' experience, and the little I have 

 learned looks small in comparison with 

 all that I need to learn. 



4. Do you approve of queen-traps in 

 swarmingtime ? Do they hinder the 

 free coming and going of the workers ? 



Erie Co., N. Y. A Sister. 



1. Let A be the hive with immovable 

 frames out of which you wish to get 

 the bees, and B the hive into which 

 you wish to put the bees. After blow- 

 ing a little smoke into the entrance, 

 turn A upside down and place over it 

 any empty box of suitable size with 

 mouth downward. With two rather 

 heavy sticks pound upon the sides of 

 the hive, and keep pounding at inter- 



vals until all, or nearly a'.l, the bees 

 are in the upper box. (If the box does 

 not fit well over the hive, and the bees 

 seem inclined to fly at you when you 

 begin drumming, treat them to a little 

 smoke.) 



After blowing a few puffs of smoke 

 into B. lift the box of bees from A, 

 gently dump them in front of B. and 

 let them run in. If there is any fight- 

 ing after they have entered, smoke 

 them until they behave. Now put a 

 queen-excluder over B, and set A over 

 this. The bees will go up to take care 

 of the brood, but not the queen ; so no 

 eggs will be laid above, and in 3 weeks 

 all brood will be hatched out, when 

 you can dispose of the upper hive as 

 you like. If you wait until brood-rear- 

 ing has about ceased — say the last of 

 September or in October — there will be 



little or' no brood to dispose of, but 

 there is more danger of fighting then. 



But are you sure it may not be better 

 to keep them over winter? Then wait 

 until they swarm, and 3 weeks after 

 they have swarmed, when there will be 

 practically no brood in the hive, drive 

 out the rest of the bees. 



2. You can sow it either this fall or 

 the spring of 1907, but in neither case 

 will it blossom before the summer of 

 1908. 



3 Yes, it is entirely suitable for a 

 beginner, and also for the most ad- 

 vanced. 



4. The hindrance to the passage of 

 the bees is not so very serious ; not so 

 much so perhaps as the hindrance to 

 ventilation. But when one can not be 

 present when a swarm issues, the trap 

 will secure the queen. 



anadian 

 eedo 



Conducted by Mokley Pettit, Villa Nova, Out. 



Hive Ventilation 



F. G. Herman, in the Michigan 

 Farmer, says this about ventilation . 



Tbe hive-entrances mu6C be sufficient — the 

 whole width of tbe hive and at least cine inch 

 high If the entrance-guards are used, then 

 2 iucheshigh, and the whole width of the hive. 

 Openings in the upper part of the hives are 

 Dot only useless but are actual nuisances It 

 is this way : An opening above wilt create a 

 circulation of air on account of the difference 

 of temperature between the inside and the 

 outside of the hive. Now if the weather is 

 cool the circulation will be strong precisely 

 when not needed, or even hurtful. If the 

 weather is very warm, the temperature is 

 about the same outside and inside, and there 

 will be almost no circulation, and the top 

 openings will then be nearly useless, besides 

 affording robbers a splendid chance to raise a 

 racket. For this reason I prefer to have an 

 ample entrance only ; that means also a hive 

 not loo high, and wide enough. 



The large entrance is quite correct, 

 but his theory about top ventilation is 

 pretty, but it does not work out. A 

 hive does not ventilate like a chimney. 

 The air is controlled by — not electric 

 fans, but " bee-fans." which, placed 

 at the entrance, draw the air out and 

 if there is an opening at the top of the 

 hive a strong colony will draw a cur- 

 rent of air in at that opening and out 

 the entrance. Of course the opening 

 should be closed in cold weather, also 

 when roober-bees are about, because in 

 the robbing season there is no swarm- 

 ing season. 



The amusing part of Mr. Herman's 

 article is his concluding advice with 

 reference to making a newly-hived 

 swarm comfortable. After advising 

 plenty of room, shade, large entrance, 

 and cooling the hive and surrounding 

 ground with water— all splendid ad- 



vice which has been tested and tried 

 for years — he says : 



" If the weather is very hot, let the cover 

 be partly off, leaving a good, big crack for the 

 air to pass through.'' 



That is splendid advice, too, but how 

 does it compare with what he says 

 above ? 



"If the weather is very warm the top 



openings will then be nearly useless." 



Of course, Mr. Herman does not be- 

 lieve what he said at first, or he would 

 not belie it in his practise with newly- 

 hived swarms. And if top ventilation 

 is good to cure the swarming fever, 

 why not apply it as a prevention rather 

 than cure ? 



Chilling' the Honey-Flow 



It is a bit amusing in reading post- 

 card crop reports to see somtthing like 

 the following : 



''No honey, too wet; rained nearly 

 every day ;" and the next card from 

 another section : " No honey, too dry ; 

 had no rain worth mentioning all sum- 

 mer." For my part, one of the best 

 averages I have had per colony was 

 taken the wettest summer I ever kept 

 bees. On the other hand, I have had a 

 good average flow in a dry year. 



One thing I have noticed, and Mr. S-. 

 T. Pettit called may attention to it par- 

 ticularly, is that a sudden drop in tem- 

 perature from 80 and over to below 50> 

 will chill the blossoms so as to stop 

 effectually a good flow of honey. This 

 point, while it is a matter we can not 

 control, is well worth knowing and 

 considering. It seems to apply equally 

 to clover, basswood and buckwheat. 



