November, 1907. 



American l^ae Journal 



Some Prime Essentials in Bee- 

 Keeping 



"Good morning, Mr. Robinson, I 

 thought I would come over during a 

 leisure moment and ask you some im- 

 portant questions concerning bees. I 

 would like to have you tell me what 

 you consider the most essential requisite 

 to successful honey production." 



"Mr. Jones, I can answer you in just 

 two little words, 'the queen.' The queen 

 is of the most importance to the col- 

 ony, to the apiarist and to successful 

 bee-keeping from a honey standpoint. 

 You can build your hive of the most 

 choice and expensive wood known to 

 the world, but unless you have a choice 

 queen of some good strain of bees your 

 mouth will water for honey before you 

 get it unless you buy it. The queen is 

 your egg-machine, and as the eggs pro- 

 duce bees, and as bees gather honey, 

 how do you expect honey, when you 

 hnve nothing to produce your bees? 

 Any queen that is not capable of de- 

 positing from 3,000 to 4,000 eggs every 

 twenty-four hours and keep it up for 

 weeks, just as the right time, is of no 

 more use than a barren hen, so far as 

 profit and honey is concerned." 



"I see ; but is that all that you con- 

 sider to be of vital importance?" 



"Why, of course not, Mr. Jones. 

 There is the hive to look to, as to ca- 

 pacity for such a queen. Then there 

 must be her breeding surface to con- 

 sider. There must be storage-room sup- 

 plied.". 



"Mr. R., what do you mean by breed- 

 ing surface?" 



"I mean territory, which is worker- 

 bee combs, of sufficient capacity to de- 

 posit enough eggs in which to produce 

 a large colony of working-bees. We 

 practical bee-men use a hive that is 

 known as the dovetail hive. It is made 

 of such dimensions as to contain 8 or 

 10 frames, known as the Hoffman self- 

 spacing frame. The frames are approxi- 

 mately 8x17 inches interior measure. 

 There are 25 worker-bee cells to every 

 square inch of surface. A frame con- 

 tains 136 square inches of surface, and 

 as there are 25 cells to the square inch, 

 you have 2400 cells to the frame. As hon- 

 ey-comb cells are built on two sides of a 

 center we must double the capacity of 

 the frame, which would be 4,800 cells. 

 As there are 10 frames in a hive we 

 would have 48,000 cells. If the apiarist 

 knows his business he will see to it that 

 his good queen has this much surface in 

 which to rear her bees." 



"Does the queen lay in all this sur- 

 face, Mr. Robinson?" 



"Never. She occupies from none at 

 all in December and January to from 

 two-thirds to three-fourths in April, 

 May or June, the rest being used for 

 storing food-supplies, which is pollen 

 and honey, this being used to feed the 

 larvae and for personal use. The bees' 

 order of depositing their honey, pollen 

 and larvae come in the form named. 

 First, next to the wood part of the 

 frame, they store their honey, placing 

 it in semi - circular form, the largest 

 amount of honey being placed in the 

 corners of the frame at the top. Sec- 

 ond, is placed the pollen, in a narrow 



belt just below the circle of honey, con- 

 forming to it. Third is the brood, 

 which occupies the rest of the frame. 



"If you have these conditions reigning 

 in your hive with a young Italian queen, 

 you can cock your hat up on the corner 

 of your head and make sure that you 

 will get a fine lot of honey from that 

 colony of bees that season, if there is 

 any to gather." 



"But, Mr. Robinson, you have told 

 me how to fix my bees, but you have 

 not told me how to get the honey." 



"You mean, Mr. Jones, how to fix the 

 bees so as to have them deposit their 

 surplus for you? All right, do this: 

 Get a super just the size of the brood- 

 chamber, one to take the same size 

 frames as above, and fill all of them 

 with comb foundation. Now, just at the 

 beginning of the honey-flow, go to the 

 hive and take 2 or 3 frames from be- 

 low and put them into the super and 

 put 2 frames with the foundation below. 

 Set the super on top of the hive and go 

 your way rejoicing. Ghoose 2 frames 

 with just the least bit of food to place 

 above. When you place the foundation 

 in the brood-chamber, place it just on 

 the inside of the outside frame of brood. 

 This is as near as I can tell you how 

 to do it, but you must bear in mind that 

 it takes years of apicultural experience 

 to do this just right, and at the right 



time. If you have done this right, and 

 at the right time, you may expect 50 

 pounds of honey from that colony in 

 due time." 



"Shall I take this honey out and let 

 them alone for the year?" 



"When these combs are full and 

 sealed, take the extractor and throw 

 out all this honey and replace, using 

 care not to break the new, tender combs. 

 Replace them in the hive. If the season 

 is a reasonably good one you may ex- 

 pect them filled again. At the end of 

 the honey-flow you can cut out some 

 of these combs for comb honey if you 

 desire some. Continue to take the honey 

 from this top chamber just as long as 

 the bees deposit it up there. I have 

 taken it from some of mine as many as 

 4 times during a season, and have of- 

 tentimes had one colony to produce over 

 200 pounds of honey during one sea- 

 son. 



"I can't tarry any longer this time, 

 but I must tell you that if you want 

 honey from your bees you must learn 

 how to get good, young Italian queens 

 into them. Further, you must cut away 

 those old crooked combs and substitute 

 therefor good, nice, straight worker-cell 

 combs. Put them in a good, nice hive 

 and then you will be all right."— T. P. 

 Robinson, Bartlett, Tex., in Dallas 

 News. 



Reflection J' 



California Bce-Kecpcr 



By W. A. PRYAL, Alden Station. Oakland. Calif. 



The Honey Crop of California 



The honey crop for 1907 has been 

 far from being what it was expected 

 to be. The rainfall was abundant in all 

 portions of the State — in fact, in most 

 places it was far above the average. 

 Vegetation made a full growth, and the 

 flowers were abundant enough. But the 

 nectar-secretion was deficient, owing 

 largely to the nights being too cool. 

 In some portions along the coast the 

 days were rather foggy. All of this 

 kept the bees from getting in what 

 would have otherwise been a record- 

 breaking honey-flow. Even the fall 

 flowers have not yielded much nectar; 

 it seems that the bees could not gather 

 enough to keep them from starving. On 

 the whole, it has been a year of cool 

 nights. Verily, it might be written, 

 "the year was a cold frost for the bee- 

 keeper." 



Sun-KII!ed Wax-Larvae 



myself (we are pretty friendly old 

 chaps) got in and "did things" to that 

 deservedly despised depredator of the 

 apiary — the wax-moth larvae. I had the 

 "worms" "done to a finish" by the sun's 

 rays. 



Now comes the versatile Mr. Louis H. 

 Scholl, and tells in Gleanings how "hun- 

 dreds of combs have been 'disinfected' 

 in this way in our yards." You are 

 right, Mr. Scholl, the "worms" will hike 

 as lively as a tramp will with a bull- 

 dog attached to the seat of his unmen- 

 tionables. 



Honey Qetting More In Evidence 



Last spring I took occasion in these 

 columns to note the fact that Old Sol 

 was a valuable ally of the bee-keeper 

 when the latter knew how to utilize him. 

 I mentioned a case where Old Sol and 



I notice the grocery stores are now 

 making a greater display of honey in 

 windows and on counters than prev- 

 iously. Why they are putting it for- 

 ward as one of the staples they carry, 

 I do not know, but it is a good thing 

 for the bee-keeper that they do. Possi- 

 bly the pure-food law has induced the 

 store-keepers to further the sale of the 

 bees' product. When so much honey has 

 been adulterated it might have made the 

 shopman's life burdensome to answer all 

 the questions as to the purity of the 

 honey he carried. Now everybody takes 



