AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



305 



the old stand, which means but little, if 

 any, accession of stores to the new 

 stand, until the young bees themselves 

 become workers in the field; and my 

 experience is that the queen, if taken to 

 the new stand, lays but little during this 

 time. In fact, I have had queens to 

 cease laying entirely at ■ such times, 

 which is quite a loss if we are wanting 

 an increase of bees. Upon the other 

 hand, if the queen is left on the old 

 stand, the increase of stores in excess of 

 the demand, as compared with what was 

 coming in before the division, seems to 

 give her a new impetus, and she in- 

 creases in laying instead of diminishing. 



Besides, I find it much easier to intro- 

 duce a queen to the young bees on the 

 new stand than to the old bees on the 

 old stand. I have sometimes found it 

 quite difficult to introduce a new queen 

 to the bees on the old stand. 



Sneedville, Tenn. 



Aljsoliile Prevenlion of Afler-Sw arms. 



Written Jor the American Bee Journal 

 BY W. HAKMER. 



The numerous articles which still ap- 

 pear in our bee-papers on the subject 

 of controlling and preventing after- 

 swarms, as well as the pitiful stories I 

 am told of bees flying away, clearly 

 show the need of some absolutely sure 

 way of preventing their issue. So many 

 are trying cures which, to my mind, 

 surpass the disease in trouble and ex- 

 pense. The opening of hives and cut- 

 ting out queen-cells is a trouble, and not 

 a cure. The double hive or swarm- 

 catcher is a trouble and expense, which, 

 after being placed in position, may not 

 be needed, so they are not perfection. 



Traps will not do, either, as there is 

 often a young queen ready to become 

 fertile, and in apiaries where hives 

 are numbered, the jumping plan and 

 turning hives partly around involves too 

 much labor and recording, especially 

 where several swarms are a daily oc- 

 currence. Why, a fellow would need to 

 be perfectly crazy-proof to come out all 

 right after trying to follow all such work 

 with side hives, traps, and swarm-catch- 

 ers, automatic, plutocratic and other- 

 wise; the jumping and moving hives 

 partly around, opening hives and cut- 

 ting out queen cells after you think you 

 have found them, and moving hives in 

 just so many days after swarming, as 

 isir. Frank Coverdalo tells about on page 

 113. 



Now, Frank, don't your young queens 

 ever take their wedding flight out 

 through those escapes ? and don't you 

 lose a percentage of them b}- so doing ? 

 or perhaps you have queen-excluders 

 over the base of the escape ; but, any- 

 way, would you not sooner do away with 

 all this work and fixings if you could 

 positively prevent the issuing of after- 

 swarms by a little manipulation at the 

 time the prime swarm issued ? Would 

 it not be money in your pocket instead of 

 out of it? Well, if I tell you, you must 

 promise not to tell, for you know there 

 is " millions in it " dor the world). 



I have never seen my system in print, 

 although the part of it we have been dis- 

 cussing is very simple, and can be writ- 

 ten in about three lines. It is simply 

 this : Clip the queen's wing, hive the 

 prime swarm on the old stand, and re- 

 move all brood and eggs. Just this, and 

 nothing more. Now, if you ever have 

 an after-swarm with this plan (your bees 

 and profits flying off to the woods), 

 please let me know it. You see, I don't 

 have to control what I never have. 



But to make the system plain in re- 

 gard to increase and the disposition of 

 these combs of brood without bees, I 

 would say that I follow the Doolittle 

 plan of cell-rearing, making nuclei when 

 the means permit, which represent my 

 increase and stand in a row or rows at 

 one side or end of my apiary, and are 

 given cells with larvae from my best 

 queens. As soon as a young queen is 

 laying, her wing is clipped, and, with 

 the aid of these combs of brood, is built 

 up into a strong colony in a week ; and 

 as I work for extracted honey, I help to 

 fill up the top chambers with these 

 combs of brood, which are a great help 

 in getting ready for the honey-flow. You 

 can get rid of a lot of brood in this way, 

 and draw on your oldest nuclei to form 

 more, instead of from your honey apiary 

 or colonies. 



I do not number my hives, but the 

 position of the stands (which I place 

 perfectly straight in rows of 10 or 20, 

 and are 4 inches high) or stand, indicates 

 the number of the colony recorded, so 

 that it can be seen at a glance what 

 number each colony represents in the 

 book without the trouble of walking 

 around a certain hive to look for the 

 figures. 



Another good thing for this system, is 

 that I do not have to introduce queens 

 to queenless hives as we are so often 

 told to do. Why, my dear brothers, the 

 queen has got to come from another 

 hive, and it seems to me to be like rob- 

 bing Peter to pay Paul, and taking a 



