Sept. 6, 1906 



American Ttee Journal 



you like the deep combs better, you will find no trouble af- 

 terward in using the few shallow supers along with the 

 deep ones. I don't see that running also for comb honey 

 makes any particular difference in the case, unless it be 

 that you think there is a possibility afterward of running 

 entirely for comb honey, and if there be such a possibility 

 then you should have no shallow supers. 



3. I don't know. I feel pretty sure it isn't best for me ; 

 but under different circumstances I might prefer it. 



4. Before the harvest no colony ever needs more than 2 

 stories, and a good many of them need only one. So you 

 see I don't need an extra story for each colony. Some, how- 

 ever, that do not need an extra story will have one all the 

 same, partly as a precautionary measure, allowing them the 

 chance of using the extra room should they need it, and 

 partly for the sake of having the bees take care of the idle 

 combs. When the time eomes to reduce all to one story and 

 put on supers, the extra stories — some of them — will be 

 piled up several stories high, over and under colonies that 

 are rather weak and are allowed to build up, and some of 

 them will be used in starting nuclei and new colonies. 

 Some of them will be needed to be filled with honey, so as 

 to have combs sealed solid full to be used wherever ueeded 

 the following spring, and sometimes a story filled with 

 empty frames will be allowed to stand until the worms begin 

 work in them, and then I wish I had been a better bee- 

 keaper so as not to allow such things to happen. Some col- 

 onies will be lost in winter and spring, and some will be 

 doubled up in spring, some empty combs will be taken from 

 the hives in exchange for the surplus combs saved over and 

 in these ways there will be enough combs to furnish the 

 extra stories needed in the spring to begin over again the 



year's round. 



♦-•-•. 



Bees Using the Old Comb 



I put bees in a Danzenbaker hive in 1' 05 ; in 1906 they 

 swarmed, and in June they hatched out the first crop of 

 bees. Will they continue to use the old comb, or should 

 that be taken out ? If so, when — or will they continue to 

 use it ? Mississippi. 



Answer. — Your question, practically, is whether comb 

 needs renewing after a certain length of time, or whether 

 the bees will continue to use it after it is several years old. 

 It has been proven very satisfactorily that the continual use 

 of combs by the bees for a number of years does not cause 

 deterioration so as to make it advisable to renew the comb. 

 Indeed, I have in my own apiary combs a third of a century 

 in use, and the bees use them just as well as ever. I am not 

 sure whether I fully understand what you mean by that 

 "first crop of bees." When a swarm is hived, the queen 

 begins laying very soon, and 21 days after the first egj; is 

 laid the first young bee will emerge from its cell, and there 

 will be a constant emerging of young bees from that time 

 all the time until breeding stops in the fall, so it will hardly 

 do to say that there is any " crop of bees " in the case. 



Bees Superseding Queens 



I had a prime swarm issue June IS, introduced a 

 shipped queen July 6, and when I took the old queen out I 

 cut out 2 ripe qneen-cells, and introdnced the new queen. 

 In IS days I found 3 new queen-cells ready to seal. Will 

 you please give me the cause of this ? Virginia. 



Answer. — There was probably nothing out of the usual 

 course of events. The regular thing is for every queen to 

 be superseded when 2 or 3 years old, and the time for super- 

 seding is usually toward the close of the harvest, although 

 it may be more commonly than supposed right after swarm- 

 ing. June IS you hived a prime swarm, and, the queen 

 being old enough to be superseded, the bees started 2 queen- 

 cells not many days after being hived, and if they had not 

 been disturbed there would have been a young queen from 

 one of these to supersede the old one. Hut you cut out these 

 cells July 6, at the same time removing the old queen and 

 introducing the new. Then as soon as the new queen had 

 fairly got to laying, or about a week after you had put her 

 into the hive, 2 more queen-cells were started, which you 

 later found ready to seal. On just what grounds the bees 

 based their reasons for starting these cells I don't know. It 

 may be that there was still left the old feeling that it was 



necessary to supersede the queen, for conditions had hardly 

 changed enough to take that idea out of their heads. But 

 it is a common thing — probably much more common than 

 generally supposed — for queen-cells to be started when a 

 new queen is introduced. The bees have been without a 

 laying queen — the queen in the cage is not to them a laying 

 queen — she doesn't lay what seems to them a satisfactory 

 number of eggs for some days after getting out of the cage, 

 and what more natural than that the bees should think her 

 a proper subject for supersedure '.' But before there is time 

 for a young queen to emerge, the queen gets back to her 

 full quota of eggs, and the bees decide that she is to con- 

 tinue in office. At any rate, it is the common thing for 

 queen-cells to be started as they were in this case, and then 

 to be destroyed before coming to maturity. 



Queenless Colony 



I will call your attention to my robbing question on 

 page 671. I did as you told me, and was very successful. 

 The robbing stopped, and the queen laid nicely, but they 

 had a few queen-cells which I cut out, and a few days later 

 I opened the hive again and found the colony queenless. 



1. Was it a mistake to cut out the queen-cells? 



2. Is it worth while to introduce another queen ? 



3. What was the cause of the colony becoming queen- 

 less ? and of so many qneen-cells in the hive? 



All the bee-keepers who saw my queen said I had a very 

 nice one, and robbing was surely stopped 4 weeks before the 

 queen was lost. Pennsylvania. 



Answers. — 1. If there was no mistake about a good 

 queen being in the hive, it was all right to cut out the 

 queen-cells. If no queen, then another could be reared from 

 one of the cells. 



2. Under all the cireumstances like enough it would-be 

 as well to break up the colony and unite with others. 



3. It is not entirely clear just when the colony became 

 queenless. Possibly the robbers may have been the guilty 

 parties, and it is possible the queen may have been acci- 

 dentally killed when you had the hive open. The queen- 

 cells would naturally be built on the death of the queen. It 

 would also be nothing very unusual for queen-cells to be 

 built upon the commotion raised by robbing. 



.Convention 

 'Proceedings 



2KS9M 



Northern California Convention 



The Northern California Bee-Keepers' Association is the 

 name of an organization which was formed at a meeting held 

 at the Court House in Sacramento last Saturday. Quite a 

 number of the prominent apiarists of northern California 

 were present at the meeting, and all of them signed the roll of 

 membership. The objects of the organization, as indicated in 

 a resolution adopted, are the mutual benefit of the members, 

 the advancement of the industry, the purchase of supplies, 

 and the marketing of the product. 



The meeting was called to order by B. B. Hogaboom, of 

 Elk Grove, who was chosen temporary chairman, with Charles 

 F. Lewis, of Oak Park, as Secretary." Mr. Hogaboom stated 

 that the meeting had been called for the purpose of effecting 

 an organization of the bee-keepers of the northern part of the 

 State, provided that should prove to be the sense of the 

 meeting. On motion of Mr Stephenson, a list of the names 

 of those present was made, together with the number of colo- 

 nies represented, with the following result: 



Irvin Myers, Franklin Jay Lewis and Charles P. Lewi-. 

 250 colonies for comb ami 250 'for extracted ; Lester B. .John- 

 son, 250 extracted ; .1. D. Baker. 100 comb and 1,000 extracted: 

 G W Stephenson, 12 comb; Thomas . I Stephenson, 100 comb; 

 B B. Hogaboom, 315 comb; II. M. Tyler, 250 comb: .1. W. 

 McDonald, 40 extracted; W. 11. I'.aker, 80 extracted. There 



