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THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



789 



-^^-^^^ 



SklelE 



Does It Pay to Move Bees to Other Fields In 

 the Storing Season ? 



BV A. F. BROWN. 



On page 611, W. T. Richardson puts this question, and 

 answers it by Riving his experience in moving bees to the 

 bean-fields of California. 



Having only recently given an article touching on items 

 connected with migratory bee-keeping, I will add something 

 more to the subject by giving here some of the successes, as 

 well as failures, I have encountered in moving bees to catch a 

 honey-flow. 



Early in February, 1894, I moved about 40 colonies five 

 or six miles, to the orange-bloom, which was good, and I 

 secured about SO pounds surplus per colony, as well as doub- 

 ling my number of colonies. The following June the colonies 

 were packt and shipt some 6.5 miles to the mangrove on the 

 coast. They were first hauled three miles to the railroad, 

 loaded into a car, and taken 40 miles, then loaded on a boat 

 and taken 12 miles down the river, and set out on the bank ; 

 within 24 hours they were bringing in new honey freely. The 

 flow lasted about 40 days. The considered a short crop, I 

 secured some 7,000 or 8,000 pounds, and I increast the col- 

 onies to 150. 



They were packt the last of August, and moved 200 

 miles down the coast on two boats ; in this move two or three 

 colonies were lost by lack of ventilation. The fall bloom 

 proved a failure, still the colonies did well in breeding up, 

 gaining about 33 per cent, increase. 



In the February following they were packt again, and all 

 loaded (n)w numbering about 200) on one large sail-boat to 

 be moved 150 miles to the orange grove on the north end of 

 the Indian river. This proved a disastrous trip. I counted 

 upon three or four days to go the 150 miles (having open 

 water two to four or six miles wide the whole length of the 

 river), but encountered a " northener " — in other words, 

 heavy wind and stormy weather — and were driven ashore, the 

 bees beingSoaded in the " hold " of the boat. Before we realized 

 it, nearly all perisht from lack of ventilation. There were 

 but about 25 colonies saved out of the lot, and these were re- 

 duced in numbers, and all the brood lost, still they built up 

 rapidly, as soon as placed in the orange grove, and with the 

 purchase of some 20 colonies were increast by June 25 to fill 

 all the hives that colonies were lost from. 



Mangrove in 1893 gave nothing, but in anticipation of 

 getting a crop from it I packt and moved my colonies about 

 40 miles north from where they were for oranges. This 

 move was made by railroad, the colonies being hauled '4 mile 

 to the car, and again when unloaded hauled about halt mile 

 to the place where the apiary was located. This was about 

 April 20 ; on the 3rd or 4th of May I found saw-palmetto 

 blooming very abundantly some seven or eight miles away 

 across the river. As there was comparatively little palmetto 

 in reach of the colonies where they were located for the man- 

 grove, and mangrove would not be opening for six weeks, I 

 promptly packt a number of colonies and moved them on May 

 5 to the palmetto. In the following three weeks these colo- 

 nies gathered an average of 60 pounds of surplus honey. 



Mangrove, as stated above, proved a failure, and early in 

 August, in driving across the country, some IS or 20 miles 

 from home, I came across a tract of cabbage palmetto that 

 was blooming very heavy. Stopping at a '• settler's " house in 

 the vicinity, I found his bees — a few in old box-hives — were 

 bringing in honey very freely. I drove home that night, and 

 the following day packt a number of colonies and was on the 

 way the following night ; in 4S hours I had my whole 200 

 colonies on the ground, hauling the bees the whole distance 

 (18 miles) by teams. The bloom lasted only 9 or 10 days, 

 and two or three were stormy, still the colonies gathered an 

 average of 40 or 45 pounds each. Then set in a long honey- 

 dsarth, and by Sept. 1 breeding had ceast altogether. 



September 1 I commenced feeding every colony, and kept 

 It up for three weeks, feeding about .S90 worth of feed. I did 

 this to have bees for the fall bloom from wild sunflowers and 

 golden-rods. There being a good deal of prairie country at 



this location, and the settlers told me It comes up to these 

 flowers every fall, iu fact, when I commenced feeding for 

 stimulating my colonies to breeding, I could see the young 

 plants coming up thick all over the prairie. 



By Sept. 25 the colonies commenced to gather some honey, 

 and in a few days they were getting from a pound to two 

 pounds of surplus, as shown by scale hive. The yield was cut 

 short by a heavy gale and storm the 9th or 10th of October, 

 and later entirely destroyed by a second gale, but the colonies 

 did very well while they could work, and gathered about 40 

 pounds per colony from the sunflowers. Stimulative feeding 

 had given six to eight frames solid with brood at the opening 

 of the bloom, and had there been no gale, I think the surplus 

 crop would have been exceptionally good. 



In December, the bees were packt and moved about 70 

 miles; hauled first to the railroad about eight miles, then at 

 the destination hauled out again half a mile to the location 

 for the apiary. This was December, 1893 ; in the February 

 and March following I secured a fine crop of orange honey, 

 upwards of 10,000 from the 200 colonies, tho all of them 

 were not workt for honey, as some had old queens and were 

 worthless. 



Leaving home about March 20 for a trip through the 

 State and to Cuba, I returned about April 25, to find the col- 

 onies breeding very lightly, owing to a honey-dearth following 

 the orange-flow. 1 decided to move at once to the saw-pal- 

 metto on the coast, and in three days, or on the 28th, 1 had 

 the colonies packt and loaded on a car, and took them 60 

 miles, to New Smyrna. Here they were unloaded onto a 

 " lighter," and a small tug towed us down the river 18 miles, 

 and we unloaded the bees on a small island. In this move we 

 lost about 25 per cent, of the colonies, and nearly all of the 

 brood, having them packt too close with screens that did not 

 leave the full size of the top of the hive open, as always here- 

 tofore. Still, nut withstanding this heavy loss, the 170 weak 

 colonies gave me 42,000 pounds of honey from palmetto and 

 mangrove in the following 70 days. A month after the flow 

 ended the colonies were packt with full size screens, and 

 moved back to the railroad, and then 100 miles, or there- 

 abouts, to the interior of the State, and arrived at their desti- 

 nation in good condition, with no loss whatever. 



In the above I have given the main moves made during 

 three years, and it will give one an idea whether it paid or 

 not. I have moved other lots of bees, and in a few instances 

 I moved a portion of this apiary short distances, or divided it 

 and put part at one place and part at another. These colo- 

 nies were in what is known here in the South as the " Dixie" 

 hive, or 8-frame (Langstroth size) hive. Of the crops of 

 honey harvested, about 22,000 pounds was comb honey, and 

 the rest extracted. The colonies run for extracted honey 

 were tiered two and three stories high in good years, and those 

 for comb honey sometimes had three and four supers on a col- 

 ony at one time. 



The expense of the moves run from §60 to $150 each. 

 This included everything, cost of transportation, packing, 

 hauling, etc. — as well as the cost of "screens." I had one 

 man with me all the time, and then hired extra help when 

 necessary. 



With my experience it has paid to move bees. Still, It 

 entails a vast amount of risk, and one knows from experience 

 what taking risks means, and what it leads to. 



Volusia Co., Fla., Oct. 9. 



Swarming Management— A Friendly Reply. 



BV "BEK-STUDEaT." 



All right, Mr. Poppleton, I am glad you thought it proper 

 to "call me down," on page 690, for it will give me a chance 

 to explain that which I did not think necessary before. None 

 of us has all the "kinks" out of our management so that 

 everything runs smoothly at all times, and we may help each 

 other greatly by reporting any short cuts we may have dis- 

 covered, and now for my "shortcut" in cutting out inferior 

 queen-cells : 



At swarming-time I have more hives ready than I ever 

 use since adopting the method of ventilation described in a 

 former article ; and when a queen is so prolific as to require 

 more room than a lOframe Langstroth hive furnishes, I am 

 always ready and anxious to help her find other quarters, and 

 every colony being near and in plain sight, I put on my veil 

 and go to the side of the hive, as soon as she swarms out, take 

 off the cover gently and begin examining the combs, aud by 

 the time the swarm has left the hive I have my work half 

 done ; and by the time they have clustered, I have finisht and 

 closed the hive, and am ready to take care of the swarm. 



