(Entered at the Post-Offlce at Chicago as Second-Class Mail-Matter.) 

 Published. Weekly at $1.00 a Year, by George W. York & Co., 334 Dearborn Street. 



CEORGE W. YORK, Editor 



CHICAGO, ILL., SEPTEMBER 20, 1906 



Vol, XLVI— No. 38 



brial ^Nofes „ 

 and Comments 1 



Supplant Poor Queens in the Fall 



This Journal has been somewhat insistent 

 upon improvement of stock by introducing 

 better stock in the fall. Not only should 

 fresh blood be introduced, but queens not 

 coming up to the mark should be supplanted 

 by young queens reared from the best 6tock 

 in the apiary. C. W. Dayton wisely 6»ys in 

 the American Bee-Keeper: 



" In the previous August or September it is 

 easy to add a dollar or two per colony to a 

 crop of honey, by this correction of a few 

 colonies. It may constitute the only clear 

 profit. When a business falls only a little 

 behind expenses it is conducive to ' the 

 blues.' It is not ea6y to build hopes on 

 failures." 



■*■ 



National Co-operation of Bee-Keepers 



A correspondent calls attention to the fol- 

 lowing sentence on page 733: "Bee-keepers 

 are usually too much scattered over a State, 

 or throughout the United States, to make 

 much of a success of co-operation on such 

 large scales," and then wants to know if this 

 is not disproved by the National Bee-Keepers' 

 Association. Reference to the page men- 

 tioned will show that the matter under dis- 

 cussion was co-operation in buying bee-sup- 

 plies and selling honey; and no doubt it 

 would have been better if the sentence quoted 

 had been thus limited; for we have no de- 

 sire to deny the grand results in some other 

 matters that have been achieved by means of 

 the co-operation of bee-keepers scattered over 

 the entire country. Many a bee-keeper has 

 been saved from the petty persecution of 

 village or city governments, egged on by evil- 

 disposed neighbors, because of the precedents 

 established through legal decisions secured by 

 the National Association; and General Mana- 

 ger France is still sending out literature of 



helpful character in this direction. That is 

 only one item; it is not necessary to refer to 

 others. If selling of honey or buying sup- 

 plies ever is helped through National co- 

 operation, we ehall be only too glad to say we 

 were wrong on that score. 



Safe Introduction of Queens 



It has been suggested by one who has evi- 

 dently had sufficient experience to teach him 

 that the introduction of queens is not always 

 attended with success, that it might be a good 

 thing to publish an editorial, " giving several 

 safe and certain methods of introducing 

 queens." Some of the veterans will smile 

 upon reading such a modest (?) request, and 

 some of them may be inclined to say, " There 

 is no one way, let alone several, without more 

 or less failures." And one may well ask, 

 " What need of more than one way, anyhow?" 



A knowledge of general principles is likely 

 to help against failure, so it may be well to 

 say something in that line. 



There must be absolute assurance that a 

 colony is queen less, if there would be cer- 

 tainty of acceptance of a strange queen. If 

 there be anything in the hive which the bees 

 regard in the light of a queen, whether it be 

 a good queen, a poor queen, a drone-laying 

 queen, or even laying workers, the stranger is 

 not likely to be received with favor. Neither 

 is one absolutely certain in this regard when 

 one has killed the old laying queen ; for the 

 presence of two queens in a hive is not now 

 regarded as such a very unusual thing. There 

 may be two laying queens, mother and daugh- 

 ter, and, what is more difficult of detection, 

 there may be besides the laying queen a virgin 

 getting ready to take her mother's place. 



The state of mind of the bees has an im- 



portant bearing. When a colony first be- 

 comes conscious of its queenlessness, signs 

 of distress are apparent ; the bees have spells 

 of running about over the front of the hive 

 and entrance, a6 if seeking for their lost 

 mother. While the bees are in this anxious 

 state of mind, they are in a mood to accept 

 almost any substitute, and in many cases no 

 caging is needed, it being only necessary to 

 drop the new queen among the bees. After- 

 ward the bees 6tart queen-cells, and seem to 

 center their affections on these, philosophi- 

 cally determining to endure what can not be 

 cured. If these queen-cells are fatten from 

 them, or if by any means they become hope- 

 lessly queenless, with no young brood from 

 which a queen can be reared, then laying 

 workers are likely to appear, and the intro- 

 duction of a queen becomes more difficult 

 than ever. Hence the advice given, to intro- 

 duce when a colony has been only 2 or 3 days 

 queenless. 



The state of the harvest has a bearing. 

 When honey is coming in abundantly, the 

 bees are intent upon that, and pay less heed 

 to the intrusion of a stranger. If no nectar 

 is to be had from the fields, feeding must be 

 resorted to. During a dearth matters are 

 aggravated by the attacks of robbers, so it is 

 well to open hives only after bees have ceased 

 to By in the evening. 



The attitude of the queen herself has a 

 bearing. If in a combative mood, the bees in 

 their turn will be antagonistic. Hence the 

 plan of some to let the queen fast half an 

 hour, and then drop her among the bees, 

 when, instead of showing fight, she will seek 

 food, and conditions being favorable other- 

 wise, she is likely to have a favorable recep- 

 tion. Another way to put her out of the way 

 of any hostility, is to give her a douche of 

 cold water, holding her in till she ceases to 

 struggle, and then dropping her on a comb 

 of brood or on a top-bar. 



The bees are likely to receive a stranger 

 more kindly if all is calm and quiet when she 

 makes her debut; hence the plan of giving 

 her in a cage to be liberated by the bees eat- 

 ing out a plug of candy. Then she comes 

 quietly out of the cage without the excite 

 ment caused by opening the hive. 



It is claimed that when a queen is in a hive 

 long enough she acquires the peculiar odor o 



