Feb. 28, 1907 



169 



American l^ee Journal 



suits. If he does not, he will live in 

 some doubt, and, perhaps, in some dread 

 of what the outcome may be. If he 

 does not, it is my experience that he 

 will have some, perhaps many, disap- 

 pointing colonies in his yard the follow- 

 ing season. 



I have always some colonics in the 

 yard with queens that I have no means 

 of knowing whether they are in a fail- 

 ing condition or not. These are the 

 colonies that have gone through the 

 season strong at all times and have 

 stored much honey. Some of the 

 colonies that are in this condition now 

 will have failing queens or no queens 

 at all in brood-rearing time next spring. 

 It is hazardous to requeen all such 

 colonies in the fall, as you may destroy 

 many a valuable queen. Therefore, it 

 is better to await developments. By 

 substituting young queens that have in 

 June and before, proven to be failing 

 ones, it may be presumed that the bee- 

 keeper has done neither the colony nor 

 himself any harm, and he is almost sure 

 to reap a balance of gain from the 

 transaction. 



Leon, Iowa. Sept. ", 1906. 



[Through an oversight, the forego- 

 ing article failed to appear when it 

 should have been published — early last 

 September. — Editor. ] 



Management of Swarms, Etc 



BY C. W. DAYTON. 



On page 1035 (1906), Mr. Grant An- 

 derson says : "Don't waste the bees' 

 time by confining the queen in a box 

 for several days." It is given as a cau- 

 tion after reading my article on page 

 931 (1906). I try to be as explicit as 

 possible, but this swarm management 

 is a whole system, and can not be de- 

 scribed in one article. It calls into 

 use plans and fixtures never before 

 used. Nearly all bee-keepers think 

 themselves more or less experts, and 

 they also doubt that an entirely new 

 system could be devised, and on this 

 account they are likely to mix up the 

 new system with their old plans, and 

 this mixing causes trouble. 



From one of my articles, which ap- 

 peared in another bee -paper, I will 

 quote : 



"If the swarm issues, say, at 8 or 9 

 o'clock in the forenoon, I shake the bees 

 from the limb into an empty hive-body, 

 having the entrance closed and a screen 

 over the entire top to give plenty of 

 ventilation, while the bees are confined 

 in it. The caged bees should be set in 

 a shady place. After being in this box 

 an hour or so, or, long enough to be- 

 come clustered, I can usually raise the 

 screen without any bees taking wing, 

 and cage the old queen. Take the queen 

 away entirely. This will make them very 

 uneasy. Late in the afternoon, or, after 

 tlTey have been in this uneasy state s or 

 6 hours, I raise one edge of the screen 

 slightly to allow the bees to get out 

 slowly and return to their old hive of 

 their own accord, but queenless." 



This is my plan or procedure to pre- 

 vent all increase, and there is no "sev- 

 eral days" nor any "as much as one 



day" about il If the bees and queen 

 are to be hivrd in a new location, or, 

 in other wmi^U, if increase is desired, 

 then leave thr queen with the bees in 

 the box. I'.ui that is not so easy a 

 job as it m.iy seem that it should be, 

 for the reason that the bees are likely 

 to desert the queen and return to the 

 hive from which they came. The rea- 

 son they desert is either because the 

 bees were not in the swarming mood, 

 or else the queen is nearly worthless. 

 The queen might be a good egg-layer, 

 but egg-layinc; docs not always prove a 

 good queen, for the bees may eat most 

 of the eggs or allow the larvae to starve 

 while plenty of larval food could be 

 had were the bees in the disposition to 

 provide it. .\nd supplying a swarm 

 with drawn combs, or a comb of un- 

 sealed brood, or clipping the queen's 

 wing, as Mr. Anderson suggests on 

 page 1035, aggravates the bad condi- 

 tion. 



We can tie a sitting hen on the nest, 

 and adjust a weight on her back to 

 compel her to "sit," but it is not "sit- 

 ting." The temperature of a sitting 

 hen is several degrees above the normal 

 temperature of other hens. It is often 

 that a hen will sit a few days and then 

 leave the nest. If we undertake to 

 compel the hen to sit, her temperature 

 will be sure to fall lower than the tem- 

 perature of other hens, which is an ill 

 temperature for the eggs. And the same 

 conditions are in operation with the 

 bees. 



It is not the number of eggs, nor the 

 arrangement of the nest, that satisfies 

 the hen, nor is it the arrangement of 

 the combs or hive that satisfies the 

 swarming bees. There is an ingredient 

 which mechanical devising can not sup- 

 ply. It is the presence of this particu- 

 lar ingredient which causes the higher 

 temperature of the sitting hen and the 

 presence of the same ingredient causes 

 a higher temperature in a swarm of 

 bees. If there is an abundance of this 

 ingredient we are sure to get a good 

 "hatch" in the case of hens' eggs, and 

 in the case of bees the new combs will 

 be rapidly constructed, brood will be 

 plentiful and well fed, and supers will 

 soon be occupied and filled with stores 

 of new honey. 



In testing swarms in a box we can de- 

 termine in a few hours' time the dispo- 

 sition and probable utility of the swarm, 

 and if their disposition is faulty it can 

 be altered or corrected. Any swarm 

 can be sent back to the old hive, but 

 as to whether they should be estab- 

 lished in a new location depends upon 

 the height of their temperature. The 

 greater their energy and disposition to 

 construct a new domicile, the higher 

 the temperature. This higher tempera- 

 ture manifests itself to the observing 

 and experienced eye because it changes 

 the actions of the bees from their usual 

 actions. It changes the pitch of the 

 sound of their wings. Any expert mu- 

 sician would soon discover this. 



If we put the swarms having virgin 

 queens in a box with a queen-excluder 

 on it, to remain until the next day, 

 about half of the swarms will desert 

 and return to the old hive, leaving the 

 queen entirely alone in the box. Where 



the queen is old, the bees never all 

 desert, but often there is but a small 

 cluster of bees which remain with the 

 queen. 



Now, if the queen is an extra good 

 one, the bees will all stay in the box 

 with her, and when the other bees come 

 home from the fields and find that the 

 swarm has left the hive these bees will 

 search about the apiary and go in with 

 the swarm in the box. By this process 

 we get a good-dispositioned quantity 

 of bees, and good queens in the swarms. 

 When bees perform in this manner we 

 may know that they mean "business," 

 and that they will construct their new 

 combs in haste. Swarms of this kind 

 generally prepare to swarm again in 28 

 days, by constructing queen-cells on the 

 2 1 St or 22d day after hiving. If drawn 

 combs or full sheets of comb-foundation 

 are put in when they are hived, there is 

 seldom made any preparations for fu- 

 ture or further swarming, at the 28-day 

 period. 



Most bee-keepers would prefer the 

 swarm and queen which do not prepare 

 to swarm. But, in reality, this swarm- 

 ing disposition is an indication of en- 

 ergy. If they lack this energy they will 

 fall short of energj' for other accom- 

 plishments, such as constructing combs, 

 filling surplus-honey supers, or brood- 

 rearing. 'This energy corresponds to the 

 steam in an engine. We would not op- 

 pose but guide it into useful action. This 

 energy starts out early in the season — 

 first, to build up sufficient brood and 

 force of bees to swarm early; not to 

 swarm once, but twice. That is, the 

 swarm is calculated to swarm. In order 

 to swarm the second time it is necessary 

 hastily to fill the hive of the first swarm. 

 Thus there is a chain of succeeding pe- 

 riods of energ>-. When the chain is in- 

 terrupted the bees become listless, less 

 industrious, less productive, and have less 

 interest for all the operations of the hive; 

 may even allow a share of the brood 

 to starve, or from lack of heat it may 

 chill, the same as eggs chill through lack 

 of attention or protection by the sitting 

 hen. The brood-cells may not be prop- 

 erly cleaned out, and filth would accum- 

 ulate in the layers of cocoons, and more 

 dead brood follows. With the introduc- 

 tion of the particular bacilli foul brood 

 results. 



By prevailing methods swarms are 

 scooped up and poured out with no 

 more consideration of the wants and 

 notions of the bees than if they were 

 pebbles. Instead of conservation, bee- 

 energ}' is extravagantly wasted; indeed, 

 the bees are often condemned because 

 they exhibit energy. Though this en- 

 ergy' can not be readily seen with the 

 naked eye, it is none the less material- 

 istic and valuable when rightly under- 

 stood. As the swarming season ad- 

 vances the old and best foragers are es- 

 tranged from all engaging interests, and 

 become transformed into mere sojourn- 

 ers in a strange land, suspicious at any 

 moment of being ruthlessly torn from 

 home and friends and other ties. It 

 might not be of so much consequence 

 had bees a memory lasting only a few 

 days, but the indications are that their 

 memory extends throughout their lives. 

 Chatsworth, Calif. 



