172 



THE AMERICAN BEE KEEPER. 



June 



attending the hives, handling and 

 selling the honey and wax and manu- 

 facturing hives and the hundreds of 

 thousands of honey boxes in which 

 the comb honey comes to market, as 

 well as in making the packages for 

 the strained honey. 



(From American Bee Journal). 



"ARTIFIOIAL" INCREASE, OK DI- 

 VIDING COLONIES. 



BY G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



A mania seems to have seized many 

 of those keeping bees, for increase of 

 colonies otherwise than by natural 

 swarming, if my correspondence is 

 any criterion to go by, for, at no 

 time in my bee-keeping life, have I 

 had so many enquiries in this matter 

 as during the past three months; 

 therefore, to save much private cor- 

 respondence I will give some of the 

 plans which I use successfully, even 

 though it may be, to quite a large ex- 

 tent, matter which I have given be- 

 fore. But before doing so, I wish to 

 say, that for this locality, I prefer 

 natural swarming to any plan of arti- 

 ficial increase, where only one swarm 

 is allowed from each old colony, and 

 where said swarm will issue in time 

 to prepare both old and new colonies 

 in good condition for the honey 

 harvest. 



The first plan I will give for arti- 

 ficial increase is what is termed by 

 some as the "nucleus plan." To be 

 of the most value, the nucleus should 

 be forced 18 or 20 days before the 

 honey-harvest, by having enough 

 bees in it to protect a frame two- 

 thirds full of brood, the larger part of 

 which should hatch during the first 

 four or five days, while said comb 

 should contain some eggs just laid, if 



possible. Besides this frame of brood 

 and bees, the nucleus should contain 

 a frame having a pound or two of 

 honey in it, the whole being set in a 

 hive and confined to one side of the 

 same by means of a division board. 



The next day after making, a 

 nearly-mature queen cell should be 

 given, or newly hatcht queen intro- 

 duced. In about 10 days, if all 

 proves favorable, the young queen 

 will be laying, when I go to the hive 

 from which I formed the nucleus and 

 select a frame of brood, nearly all of 

 which are gnawing out of the cells, 

 and add this to the nucleus, always 

 putting a frame of comb or comb 

 foundation into the old colony to take 

 the place of the one taken out, other- 

 wise too much drone comb would be 

 built; for colonies that are allowed to 

 build comb under these conditions 

 nearly always build drone comb. 



I now wait four or five days, when 

 I go to the old colony and take out 

 four frames of brood, from which all 

 the bees were shaken, as they were 

 from the last mentioned frame, when 

 I carry them to the nucleus. I now 

 fill out each hive with empty comb or 

 comb foundation, and put on the sur- 

 plus arrangement. 



By the above, each colony is made 

 of about equal strength, and the 

 brood is so taken out of the old hive 

 that the colony does not have a desire 

 to swarm. The old colony will have 

 the most field bees for the first week 

 or so, but the other will soon make the 

 stronger colony of the two. 



My second plan is to make one 

 colony from each old one, on the prin- 

 ciple of division of bees instead of 

 division of brood, as in the above 

 case. In using this plan we must 



