388 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



November 



cellar is all below the frost line there will he 

 very little condensation of moisture. Try to 

 pile your hives with only a light quilt over 

 the frames, without a cover and with full 

 opening at the bottom. Let us know how you 

 succeed with this method. We do not think it 

 necessary to use absorbents in the cellar. 



2. Are you sure that the shaking was the 

 cause of getting so much surplus? In that 

 case you evidently had the .bulk of the bees 

 just in time for the harvest and not too many 

 after that. You can drum the bees up into 

 another hive, but for my part, I believe I 

 would rather shake than drive. I would con- 

 sider it too slow in treating for foulbrood. 



3. Yes. They seem to realize that the sea- 

 son is nearing its end and to be afraid of mis- 

 chief on the part of intruders. 



4. Yes, it gives them more time to build 

 comb. 



5. Whether to winter in one or two hive- 

 bodies depends upon the size of the hives. Hut 

 Dr. Miller was very successful in wintering 

 in only one body with 8-frame hives. They 

 usually have enough honey for winter, espe- 

 cially if placed in the cellar. 



DR. MILLER'S LAST ANSWERS 



Since Dr. Miller's death, Mrs. 

 Miller has returned to us a few let- 

 ters with his answers. He left some 

 unfinished work in his typewriter 

 when he was taken ill for the la>t 

 time. The following answers will h^* 

 the last from Doctor Miller. 

 Winter Problems 



1. My hives face southeast, away from the 

 prevailing winds of winter. They are lo- 

 cated high and are exposed to severe west and 

 north winds during the winter. It is not pos 

 sible to move them to the cellar, which is 

 heated; neither is it possible to move them 

 to a less exposed position. What would '>e 

 the best way to winter the colonies under the 

 circumstances? The temperature frequenily 

 falls to zero and below. 



2. Would you advise leaving the wall space 

 as a dead air space, or should I pack the space 

 with some material? 



3. Should the small ventilator holes be closed 

 in the cover above the chaff tray? 



4. vv'hat would be the best way to feed these 

 colonies should it become necessary to do so? 



5. Two of the colonies are small. Would it 

 be advisable to combine them in one hive? If 

 so, how could they be combined to give them 

 the benefit of the chaff tray when each of the 

 two colonies has a queen which wou'd have lo 

 be kept separp.te from the other one in some 

 manner;*. tlHlO. 



Answers. — 1. In southern Ohio a do'ible- 

 walled hive ought to give enough protection to 

 stand out in the open. Although you have some 

 below-zero weather, it is not for long, and it is 

 the continuous cold weather that's hard on 

 bees. 



2. Use packing. 

 3. Probably better leave them open. 



4. Doii't think of feeding in winter, but 

 make sure that they have enough stores while 

 the bees are still flying. It is not important 

 what kind of feeder you use, but a popular way 

 is to use the friction-top honey pails with holes 

 punched in the covers, reversing the pails. 



5. Have a queen-excluder between the two 

 hives, and have chaff tray only over the upper 

 one. If very weak, unite into one, sacrificing 

 one of the (luccns. 



A Queer Experience 



I started a nucleus about three weeks ago 

 with two frames of brood and two queen-cells 

 from a colony that had swarmed. One queen 

 came out and the other cell was destroyed. 

 After about 12 days the queen did not lay. i 

 found her outside, dead. I then gave them a 

 piece of brood from another colony and they 

 started 6 queen-cells about 9 days ago. Today, 

 August l."), I found both combss full of eggs, as 

 I never saw a comb before, in fact, as much 

 as 15 eggs in some cells and brood 3 to 5 days 



old, but could not find a queen. Now where 

 did those eggs come from. They could not 

 have been laying workers, as they were not 

 queenless long enough to get Ihcm. The eggs 

 are compact, too, just as if a good nueen laid 

 them. The bees are in a small hive, just large 

 enough for two combs. 



MINNESOTA. 

 Answer. — As nearly as I can guess from the 

 data given, I should say that laying workers 

 are the culprits in the case. You say they were 

 not queenless long enough. But bees are freaky, 

 especially at doing something bad, and don't 

 always follow the rules. Besides, they were 

 queenless to all intents and purposes from the 

 time you formed the nucleus, for the young 

 queen or queens they had don't count, as they 

 probably never laid; at least they never laid 

 eggs that counted. The plurality of eggs in a 

 cell is not positive proof of laying workers, but 

 leans in that way. The regularity of eggs is 

 sometimes just as great as with a normal queen, 

 especially if there are no drone-cells present. 



Granulation of Honey * 



Would you be kind enough to let me know 

 how they heat extracted honey so it won't 

 granulate? SOUTH DA1\.(JTA. 



Answer. — I'm sorry to say 1 don't know of 

 any satisfactory way to treat extracted ho'ney 

 so it will not granulate. But you can do as 1 

 did. Put on each package instructions for 

 liquefying it, taking it for granted that H 

 always will granulate. Doing that way I never 

 had a complaint. 



Moving^ Bees 



I have just bought four hives of bees in 10 

 frame hives with extracting supers (shallow). 

 I have been trying to close the hives up at 

 night when the bees are all in. The bees have 

 never gone in enough these hot nights to 

 close them up. Please tell me how to move 

 the hives half a mile and get all the bees. 

 MISSISSIPPI. 



Answer. — Give ventilation abundantly by 

 every means you can. Raise the hive and raise 

 the cover. Sprinkle or spray the hive and the 

 bees until the bees go in. But don't overdo 

 the business, for if you throw too heavy a lot 

 of water on them the bees will just stay in a 

 wet mass without stirring. Just spray lightly 

 and patiently on the edge of the cluster and 

 drive them. But after you have fastened them 

 in and moved them, that evening or early next 

 morning, you will find that some of the bees 

 for the next day or two will return to the old 

 place if it is not more than a mile away. It 

 will help against this if you set up a board in 

 front of the entrance, and if it is in the morn- 

 ing, before opening the entrance pound on 

 the hive until the bees set up a roaring. In 

 spite of this, some may go to the old stand, so 

 set a hive to deceive them, putting in the hive 

 a comb with a little honey in it, and possibly 

 some brood, although a dry comb may do. 

 Then take these bees to the new place, repeat- 

 ing if necessary. 



How to Knour a Good Queen 



1. How can you gauge or judge the quality 

 or desiraDility of a queen? 



2. How can a "failing (lueen" be identified? 



3. Should anything be done in the fall to in- 

 duce brood-rearing to ensure a strong colony? 



4. w hat inqirovement in one's bees may be 

 expected as a result of always making increase 

 from the best queen? Is there anything of 

 value jjublished on methods of improving bees 

 by selection or breeding? ILLINOIS. 



Answers. — 1. A queen is judged much as a 

 cow is judged — by her work. Only in the case 

 of the queen she is judged not so much by 

 her own direct performance as by the per- 

 formance of her worker progeny. Other things 

 being equal, the colony which yields the larg- 

 est amount of honey has the best queen in '.he 

 apiary. 



2. A failing queen will show patchy work. 

 Instead of having the comb evenly and com- 

 pactly filled with worker-brood.* there will be 

 more o less empty cells mixed in with the 

 worker-brood, and especially she will show 

 drone-brood in woiker-cells. These cells, when 

 sealed, instead of showing a plain, flat surface, 

 as normal worker-i.rood should, will look like 

 a lot of little marbles oecause of the rounded 

 form of the capping of each worker-cell that 

 has drone-brood in it. I know it is commonly 

 advised to replace a failing queen, and in gen- 

 eral it may be advisable, but in my own practice 

 I generally leave it to the be**, to supersede 

 their queen when in their judgment it should 

 be done, and generally find my confidence well 

 placed. 



3. With a good strain of bees and in a good 

 locality, it is unnecessary to do anything. If, 

 however, the flow of honey ceases early enough 

 to stop the rearing of brood long before the 

 weather becomes cool — say in August in your 

 locality — then it may be advisable to resort 

 to light and continuous feeding, so as to in- 

 duce the queen to lay and have a stock of 

 young bees for winter. A young queen is 

 likely to lay later than an old one. 



4. The improvement to be expected depends 

 on what you start with. If you start with bees 

 that are hustlers, your best efforts at improve- 

 ment will be rather limited in results, out still 

 may pay well. Start with bees that are very 

 poor, introduce a queen of the best kind and 

 continue to breed from the best, and in a very 

 few years you may quadruple your annual 

 take of honey. 



I know of no monogram on the subject, out 

 much will be found scattered among apicul- 

 tural literature, and among back numbers of 

 the different bee journals. Not very long ago 

 the subject was especially discussed in two dif- 

 ferent numbers of the American Bee Journal. 



Robbing, Swarming, Etc. 



1. While yesterday and the day before, giv- 

 ing colonies the Demaree, there evidently was 

 considerable robbing — to some extent dead bees 

 in consequence. A day after all seems re- 

 quieted. Is this robbing serious enough so 

 that it should influence one? How do the most 

 enterprising beekeepers act in such situation as 

 just portrayed? 



2. On the 24th of July I met with a few 

 comb-honey colonies that this season have not 

 shown any symptoms of swarming, which were 

 in about as fine a condition as is possible — 

 full of brood in all stages, eggs and bees. 

 W ould yo^u have removed some of the frames 

 of capped brood, or trusted to good luck that 

 as to non-swarming they would continue as tnus 

 far? 



3. As to the Demaree, where is it best lo 

 place frames with eggs, under or above ex- 

 cluder? PENNSYLVANIA. 



Answers. — 1. I'ni not sure exactly wfiat the 

 most enterprising beekeepers would do in such 

 a situation, but I would hardly expect to do 

 much Dcmareeing at a time when robbing 

 would o-esult in dead bees. For, with proper 

 care on the pert of the beekeeper, there is not 

 likely to be robbing at a time when bees need 

 treatment to keep them from swarming. If 

 they have gone to the last of July without 

 needing any treatment, and there is at that 

 time so little yield that they are bad about 

 robbing, it would hardly seem that they would 

 be very strongly bent on swarming. But hav- 

 ing begun, I think I should crowd it through. 



2. I should most likely do as you did — in- 

 deed, most certainly. So long as a colony of 

 its own accord shows no tendency toward 

 swarming, nothing better can be done than 

 to let it alone and be thankful. 



3. Except one frame with perhaps not jnuch 

 brood, all brood should go above the ex- 

 cluder, so that would put all eggs above ex- 

 cc[>t in that one frame. 



