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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Sept. 30, 



the hive, and use but very little smoke, so the bees kept right 

 on working out and in both hives about as freely as tho they 

 had not been disturbed. In this aianner we can rear very 

 good queens, but not always the best. 



Each division casta good-sized swarm. All the rest of his 

 Increase was by natural swarming. That queen has filled the 

 hives and led out six large swarms besides the first divided 

 " swarm." It is Aug. 30, and if the weather Is right, she has 

 another good mouth and a half yet to swarm in. That queen 

 was one of my own rearing. All the queens I obtained last 

 season, with the exception of two from other parties, have 

 been superseded, and not one of my own rearing has failed 

 yet. My Increase this season has nearly all been from queens 

 of my own rearing. 



A queen that comes up to my standard will fill the combs 

 as solid and smooth as a board with brood when sealed. I 

 have them that when I put in a foundation every cell with the 

 exception of about an inch at the top and two inches in the 

 top corners will have an egg deposited in it, and all hatch at 

 about the same time. 



Now, we will suppose I had kept the queen I had sold to 

 Arthur, run her for honey instead of increase— it could have 

 been done on the Dadant plan, as I have abundance of reason 

 to know. Yes, you certainly can keep them from swarming 

 after the honey-flow commences, right here in California. 



Arthur has three supers filled with honey, and he pur- 

 chast one dollar's worth of comb foundation for starters. I 

 cannot tell how long lived that queen will be; neither can I 

 tell how long lived her workers will be, but I have had queens 

 that kept up their vigor until six years old, and workers from 

 such a queen, hatcht in May, were many of them alive in 

 October. If I live long enough, there Is more coming about 

 queens, and I was never known to die yet, so have patience. 



Orange Co., Calif. 



Colony in a House Basement — Season's Report. 



BY G. S. CREGO. 



I began the season with eight colonies, all in 10-frame 

 dovetailed hives, seven of them having been wintered on the 

 summer stands, and the remaining colony In the basement of 

 my house. In regard to this latter colony, my experience 

 would Indicate that there Is little danger of keeping bees too 

 warm if they have all the stores they can consume. This hive 

 is located within about 12 feet of the furnace with which I 

 heat the house, sitting back about a foot from a window, and 

 having a passage-way the full width of the hive-entrance 

 leading out through a slot sawed In the bottom rail of the 

 window. The hive was not packt in any way, and I do not 

 think the temperature went below 55^ at any time during the 

 winter, and much of the time it must have been nearly 70 ; 

 The colony was very strong at the beginning of last winter, 

 having probably 50 pounds of sealed honey. In March there 

 were good-sized patches of sealed brood In the central combs, 

 and in May I bad to put on sections In order to head off 

 swarming preparations. The bees went into the sections at 

 once, havltig the tirst super filled and nearly all capt on June 

 21, the honey being almost entirely furnisht by dande- 

 lion. While some of the colonies outside stored more honey 

 In sections during the season, none of them started work In 

 the supers until about the time this colony had Its first one 

 filled. The product from this basement colony, exclusive of 

 the dandelion honey, was 96 completed sections, 16 more 

 being partly filled but not capt at the end of the honey-flow. 



I had only one swarm (which I re-uulted with the parent 

 colony 48 hours after It Issued), my only Increase being a 

 swarm which deserted from some other yard and came to mo. 

 My entire crop amounts to 750 sections of honey, and about 

 300 pounds of extracted. Tho two colonies producing the 



most honey were hybrids, one turning out 212 sections, and 

 the other filling 30 Hoffman frames for extracting. A third 

 colony — Italians — completed 112 sections and 10 combs for 

 extracting. 



Aside from the colony which sent out the one swarm, only 

 one other made any preparations for swarming, which I nipt 

 in the bud by taking away their queen for five days and cut- I 

 ting out cells, after which I returned the queen by simply let- ■ 

 ting her run In at the entrance. 



The honey is of unusually good quality this season, and j 

 sections as a rule well filled, 144 sections, sold to a grocer, I 

 weighing 141 pounds net. I 



My present 9 colonies are all very strong, and have an | 

 average of not less than_40 pounds of sealed stores each on 

 which to stand the winter. I put a packing case over each 

 hive, on its summer stand, putting about three inches of dry 

 leaves all around the hive. For top covering I remove the 

 hive-cover and put over the frames a board ^ inch thick, and 

 on top of this board I put S or 10 inches of leaves with the 

 hive-cover laid on top of the leaves. The thin pine board 

 allows sufficient ventilation to keep the inside of the hive per- 

 fectly dry. Cook Co., 111., Sept. 15. 



How to Winter Bees in Central Illinois. 



BY C. P. DADANT. 



QuEs. — "How would you winter bees In central Illinois — 

 outdoors or indoors ? — Subscriber." 



Ans. — We usually winter our bees out-of-doors, with a 

 shelter of forest leaves packt around three sides of the hive, 

 held in place by a sort of lattice-work, made of lath and 

 twine. We aim to leave the front or south side of the hive I 

 uncovered, to give the bees the advantage of every sunny day. 



We have, like many others, had our hobbles in wintering. 

 We have tried cellar-wintering, trenches or silos, chaff hives, 

 box-covers, and plain exposure. We had ups and downs, suc- 

 cessful years and disastrous ones, during our 33 years of ex- 

 perience In this climate, and we have come to the conclusion 

 that we are here on the limit of the successful outdoor winter- 

 ing climate for bees. A little farther north than the line of 

 central Illinois we believe It is probably safest to winter In 

 the cellar, but here, or farther south, the outdoor exposure in 

 ordinary winters cannot be much Improved upon. 



Mr. Dadant, Sr. began his bee-keeping experiences here 

 In 1864, and for three or four years did not attempt to Im- 

 prove on the natural circumstances of the bees. Then he 

 tried a trench or silo. In a manner similar to the method used j 

 by farmers to keep potatoes, turnips or cabbages. For a few 

 years this method succeeded well, and the bees seemed to ' 

 prosper, being furnisht ventilation by a series of small tubes 

 reaching through the ground covering. The trenches were 

 usually dug when the ground began to freeze, and those shel- 

 tered repositories lookt very warm and cozy, being first cov- 

 ered with boards, then with abed of straw, then with dirt and 

 another bed of straw, and more dirt, till a thickness of 12 or 

 18 inches was reacht. But one winter it began to rain shortly 

 after the bees were put in, and the winter remained mild and 

 soft. The ground was soakt all winter, with an occasional 

 superficial freeze, and when the bees were removed in the 

 spring many of them were dead from dampness, the combs 

 were moldy, and the hives In decidedly bad condition. This 

 ended our experience with trenches. 



We then tried thick-wall hives, movable-frame hives 

 made of straw two Inches thick. These were a positive Im- 

 provement over the one-inch pine bee-hives, but they were so 

 difficult to make, and so hard to keep In repair, that we finally 

 abandoned them to try double-wall hives. The chaff hive with 

 wall three Inches thick and filled with chaff or sawdust took 

 our fancy to such an extent that we manufactured 80 of these 



