June I'J, 1902. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



391 



all my instructions, and had four excellent colonies: all 

 wintered and came out stronfj in the spring. No spring- 

 dwindling there, you bet, as tlioir queens and hees were the 

 long-lived variety. Why? Hccausc the (|ueens were nat- 

 urally reared at superseding time. 



Mr. Drake had that log in his yard five years, and no 

 knowing how long they had been tlicre before he found it ; 

 and it had not swarmed in all that time. It would prob^ibly 

 have taken H or 10 queens, such as we usually get, to keep 

 the number of bees that were in that log, and 20 queens 

 such as I liave received would not do it. 



That discovery I will explain farther on, probably in 

 my next article. 



A writer some time ago in the American Bee Journal 

 said that he had purchased lots of queens, and but very few 

 lasted one year ; SO percent of the very light-colored ones 

 <3ied the first winter, and none gave the satisfaction of those 

 of his own rearing. I can fully endorse what that writer 

 says ; it is utterly impossible to receive the profit from such 

 short-lived, worthless queens that one can from one long- 

 lived, properly reared one ; and the former are a loss to the 

 party introducing them, every time. 



In olden times we every now and then heard of some 

 one discovering a tremendous colony of bees in a cave, so 

 numerous that they in flying out and in darkened and ob- 

 scured the sun. Well, there may be a grain of truth in such 

 stories as well as several grains of imagination or falsehood. 

 No one that has not seen as large colonies as I heretofore 

 have mentioned — the basswood log, the colony that I saw 

 taken out of a large dry-goods box at Decorah. Iowa, and 

 my large hive, four times the capacity of a standard 10- 

 frame Langstroth hive, where the bees have been in long 

 enough to rear queens to suit the capacity of the hive — can 

 realize the number of bees that one queen can rear, and 

 that workers will live to be four months old in the working 

 season instead of 30 days, as is the case of three months"-old 

 queens and their workers. Now, by rearing your cheap, 

 inferior queens in a very unnatural manner, you have 

 shortened the life of the queen from 4, 5 and 6 years to from 

 3 to 18 months. You have shortened the life of the workers 

 in proportion, consequently lessened the production : you 

 have also lessened the vitality. 



Last season I ordered 12 untested queens from six dif- 

 ferent breeders ; some of them I received quite late in the 

 season. One received late in May was superseded the first 

 of September. Two reared paralyzed brood ; two had win- 

 ter dwindling — what our Eastern bee-keepers call " spring 

 dwindling." 



I sold 10 colonies this spring, and kept two and one 

 black nucleus. One of the Italian colonies is summer 

 dwindling now, that is, the bees are dying off with old age 

 as fast as the queen can supply the loss. She is fairly pro- 

 lific, but the deaths keep about even with the births. The 

 other is a fairly average colony. The black nucleus has 

 built up to a good colony, having a two-story hive com- 

 pletely filled. It was a starved-out swarm that I picked up 

 last fall, and gave them three frames of comb and two 

 combs filled with honey, one on each side of the empty 

 combs. They went right to breeding, and bred all winter. 



A neighbor has 12' colonies, or swarms that he picked 

 up, the first one a very small one taken out of a house, and 

 it is small yet and alwaj's will be, as it was somebody's 

 starved-out cheap Italian queen, from all appearances. The 

 bees die of old age as fast as the queen supplies their places ; 

 she will never fill the hive. Orange Co., Calif. 



(To be contittued.) 



A Bee-Cellar Blasted from the Rock. 



Read at the Wisconsi?i. State Convention, held in February, 1902, 

 BV C. H. PIERCE. 



My apiary at Kilboum is situated at the east end of sand- 

 stone bluff, said bluft" fronting the Wisconsin river at The 

 Dells, and running due east about SO rods. The east end of 

 the bluff, where my yard is situated, is about 25 feet above 

 the general level of the ground. 



I began at the ground level and dug a trench to the face 

 of the bluff, about 20 feet long, and 6 feet wide. The earth, 

 next to the rock or bluff, was about 8 feet in depth. I then 

 began and blasted out a tunnel, with dynamite, 4 feet in width 

 6 feet in length, and 6J feet in heighth. Then putting the 

 charges in the corners, I widened the tunnel to 8 feet in width 

 and 12 feet in length, making a room 8x12 feet. 

 _ The rock, being soft sandstone, went all into sand at each 



blast, for a space of about 1 to IJ feet each side of the drill- 

 hole, and as decj) as the drill-hole, generally from 24 to '.W 

 inches. We then shoveled the sand into a wheelbarrow and 

 w+iccled it outside. The eelliir went in very i|uickly and very 

 eluapl\' — I believe the last ;{ feet we went into ccst about 

 $2.00 for material, sharpening tools, etc. 



Two men who understand blasting could very easily go 

 in 3 feet or more in a day. 



There are three doors leading into the cellar, also 2 ven- 

 tilators — one ventilator that brings in fre.sh air from inside 

 the .second door, starts from the floor, and passiing into 

 the cellar and escaping near the ceiling: and one for foul 

 air, starling from about one fool from the floor near the center 

 of the cellar, going t(j the ceiling and passing out-of-doors. 

 There is a door in the foul-air ventilator near the ceiling that 

 can be opened when the air in the cellar becomes too warm. 



Last winter I had but 2 doors and 4 inch ventilators, this 

 winter 1 have 3 doors and 8 inch ventilators. 



Now as to its merits as a place to winter bees: Being but 

 the second winter it is hardly a fair test, however. Last 

 winter I put in 30 colonies. 4 of them nuclei on 3 frames. A 

 few days after being put in, the thermometer in the cellar 

 stood at 4.S degrees: it gradually went down until the lowest 

 point reached was 39. 



There was considerable moisture in the cellar, showing iu 

 drops on the ceiling, dead bees in the hive-entrances and on 

 the floor showing mouldy; a long, hairy mould on the door- 

 jambs and ventilators, but apparently no moisture inside the 

 hives. I removed the bees from the cellar April 1. all in 

 excellent condition, with no loss. 



This winter I have .57 colonies, 16 of them nuclei on 4 

 frames. They were put in November 16. A few days after 

 being put in the thermometer stood at 47; low^est point 

 reached so far 43. January 20 the bees were quiet and all 

 doing well. There is very little nioisture to be seen this win- 

 ter; no drops upon the ceiling; scarcely any mould to be seen; 

 moisture shows some upon the inner door, which is 

 painted; also the ventilators feel damp. I lay the little ap- 

 pearance of moisture to the third door and the larger venti- 

 lators. 



I winter mv bees with hive bottom-boards on and no 

 covers. I leave the queen-e.xcluders on for a bee-space over 

 the combs. In the place of covers I put on 2 thickness of a 

 grain bag — a bag cut in two in the middle makes a cover for 

 2 ten-frame hives. 



The hives are tiered up in the cellar with 2-inch strips 

 across the top of each hive, for ventilation. 



I expect ne.xt fall to widen the tunnel of the cellar where 

 the doors are situated, to 8 feet, the same as the main room; 

 then widen the trench and build two stone walls, with timbers 

 across the top, some porous material on the top of the timbers, 

 and dirt over all, with a board roof over the dirt, giving about 

 i of the cellar a porous roof. This will allow all moisture to 

 escape, and, I believe, make a perfect wintering-place for the 

 bees Dane Co., Wis. 



SI 



Making Rapid Increase of Colonies. 



BV MRS. F. S. A. SNYDER. 



If you have only one colony and wish to increase to 4, 

 just as early as possible begin to feed, and it will pay \-ou to 

 buv a few pounds of extracted honey and feed through a 

 feeder all thev will consume. I say extracted honey because 

 bees will decline to store sugar s^-rup just as soon as the 

 nectar- vields begins. I have experienced this repeatedly, and I 

 think uncapped frames placed in brood-chamber invariably 

 cools the brood and retards hatching. 



Now, when the hive is just boiling over with bees, honey 

 and brood, make a box exactly the length of the hive you use, 

 and just wide and deep enough to hold -5 of the frames. 

 Place 5 of the frames containing the most brood, bees and all. 

 in the box. and shake the balance of the bees on a white cloth 

 at the entrance of the box. or really- contracted hive, thus 

 crowding all the bees and the queen in on the 5 frames, and 

 close them down with a bee-quilt and one or two newspapers 

 over the quilt, and cover up warm. 



Take the 3 remaining frames with the old hive and keep 

 in a warm room with division-boards and a thick blanket — 

 anything to keep the brood from chilling. This is best done 

 just at the commencement ot the honey-yield, and if you open 

 the contracted hive with the .5 frames and all the bees and 

 queen towards the evening of the following day. you -svill be 

 surprised to find from 30 to 40 queen-cells started; mine 

 started 46 in one night. 



Now remove the contracted hive off the old stand, and 



