THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



261 



ing the swarming fever, that lias fallen 

 under my observation, is disliubance or 

 handling brood in swarming time. This 

 work of handling brood should all be got 

 along with before June and after the boxes 

 arei)Ut on, the brood nest should not be dis- 

 turbed till after swarming time, uidess they 

 should swarm out. Another eause of 

 swarming is siueading the brood nest in 

 May by inserting empty combs between the 

 brood. If stocks are prolilic they should 

 be strong and early enough to spread their 

 own brood as fast as necessary. If an 

 empty comb is inserted between l)rood in 

 sucli a stock they will till it with eggs in 34 

 hours, and it will all hatch at once, making 

 too many bees of the same age, thereby 

 crowding the hive and getting up the 

 swarming fever in consequence. Another 

 cause of swarming that we can't control is 

 an unsteadj- yield of honey caused l)y bad 

 weather coniining the bees to the hive 

 several days at svvarming time, they till the 

 hive with brood and feel their crowded 

 condition. To recapitulate, preventives — 

 shade, ventilation, abundant box room, tier- 

 ing up, small brood cliamber, early breeding 

 and steadj^ yield of nectar. Causes or 

 swarming fever — disturbance by handling 

 brood in swarming time, too much spread- 

 ing of the brood nest in May and June, and 

 bad weather causing an unsteady yield. 



I wintered 20 stocks in a bee house and 18 

 in packing boxes out-doors; those in the 

 boxes eat less honey and lost less bees than 

 any 1 ever saw wintered, although 8 of them 

 were light stocks made up from queen rear- 

 ing nucleus. My first swarm was from one 

 of those. Still i can succeed with the liouse 

 apiary, have wintered in it for 3 years with- 

 out losing a stock, and have wintered in 

 packing boxes for two years witliout loss, 

 and think they breed up taster early in the 

 latter. Through the sunnner season I ex- 

 pect to get about ten stings in the bee house 

 to one out-doors, that will be about the 

 average where these large, non-swarming 

 stocks are used, as boxes cannot be handled 

 in the bee house with anything like the 

 facility that they can out-doors, where you 

 can get at your hive on all sides. Had five 

 stocks to swarm from the bee house, six if 

 we count one that lost the old queen and 

 swarmed out when the 'young queen came 

 out for her bridal flight; and had .5 to swarm 

 from the 18 out-doors. I l)0xed the 38 stocks 

 and two swarms and have made an increase 

 of 4 to the ))resent time. The 40 stocks 

 averaged about lOO Tt>s. of white comb 

 honey, that is finished and taken off. and 

 there was a good deal left in an unfinisiied 

 condition, some of it nearly finished. They 

 got throvigh on the white the 2.5th of July, 

 iroin that time to Aug. .5th they did nothing 

 apparently but kill drones. They are now 

 working slowly on buckwheat, but if this 

 heat and drouth holds, as the appearance in- 

 <licates, it will be a short job. 



Took 4(1 tiuished boxes (our boxes weigh 

 when finished nearly 4 lbs.) from the best 

 stock; they have 20 on the hive, some near- 

 ly full of comb and some partly sealed. 

 From some have taken from 30 to 43 finish- 

 ed, and from others less. Two that lost 

 their queens in June, 1 managed to keep 

 along by giving them brood frohi those that 

 swarmed out, so they finished about 70 lt)s. 

 each, but had to extract their brood combs 

 once. Some think it better to hive the 

 sw^arms and put on boxes, thinking they 

 will get more honey from the two than 



from one on the non-swarming plan, ac- 

 cordingly I hived my first swarm on June 

 12th, put on the boxes the 13th, and they 

 took right hold. About .5 days from the 

 I'-iih gave them 4 couibs with brood from 

 another slock; gave unfertile (lueen to old 

 stock, tof)k i:; finished boxes from swarm 

 and iO from old stock, making 23 in all, of 

 course 1 have another stock, but had enough 

 before. J. P. MooitE. 



Binghampton, N. Y., Aug. 9, 1886. 



[Many thanks, friend Moore, for so full 

 and satisfactory a reply to our inquiry. 

 Some of your suggestions are quite new to 

 us. In this connection it may be well to 

 mention that the late Adam Grinnn made a 

 strong point of ventilation at the time of 

 working in boxes. Ilis plan was to put on 

 boxes that did not entirely cover the frames 

 and then block up the back end of the 

 cover. 



The many kind words spoken of our 

 JouKNAL are very grateful, but please 

 don't judge too uncharitably those editors 

 who are interested in the sale of articles 

 that come in the line of bee-keeper's sup- 

 plies. We think some good, at least, is 

 done by it, and can only wish that all 

 editors who are interested in such sales 

 may be honest enough to recommend only 

 that which is good, whether it may be to 

 their own private interest or not. It seems 

 almost a matter of necessity that the pub- 

 lisher of a bee-keeper's medium shall do 

 more or less toward providing for the wants 

 of his patrons, as constant calls are made 

 upon him to acconunodate in that way, and 

 we think it rather fortunate for The Amer- 

 ican Bee Joukxal that the publisher and 

 editor are not one and the same person; as 

 the publisher, Mr. Newman, may do what 

 he pleases toward furnishing supplies (and 

 sometimes he has done so at a loss to him- 

 self) without in the least infiuencing any 

 opinions expressed in these columns editori- 

 ally. The long experience of Mr. Newman 

 as a publisher gives him an advantage that 

 he would not have if he had spent all his 

 time working among bees or writing editor- 

 ials.— Ed.] 



Forthe American Bee Journal. 



Comb Guides. 



There has been a great deal «aid of late 

 about artificial comb or conU) foundation. ] 

 have never seen a sample of it, but from 

 what I have been able to gather from the 

 discussions, I have come to the conclusion 

 that the most useful and practical comb 

 foundation is a simjde wax comb guide, say 

 one inch deep, and full length of top bar to 

 be pressed in place by a die worked by a 

 suitable lever. I think such a machine 

 could be constructed at a trifiing cost, and 

 be made a source of profit both to the manu- 

 facturer of the machine and to the apiarist. 



