1801 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



355 



remain iiibidc to build combs, while the nectar 

 abounds in ilie lields. they swarm. 



Most i)c<'-k('('p<'rs ihinlv that our hives are too 

 large to raise comb hoiu'y: furthei'inore, a gi'eat 

 many iiave reduced their Langstroth hives to 

 <'iglit frames. IJut when we made our experi- 

 ments, tlie extractor was not yet invented; and 

 for sevei'al years after its invention, as extract- 

 ed honey was diCticult to sell, we raised comb 

 honey, in small boxes first, tlien in 3-lb. vVdair 

 sections; and our crops wei'(! not smallei' in 

 quantity than those of bee-keepers using small- 

 er hives, whose apiaries were in the same lo- 

 ditionas ours. 



One of the advantages of large hives is, that 

 their queens, during the summer, have a great 

 many empty cells in which they can lay, 

 and the workers a large space in which they 

 can lay up a quantity of tine summer honey for 

 winter. 



I know that both these propositions are in di- 

 rect opposition to the new doctrine which ad- 

 vises the bee-keepers to contract the brood- 

 chamber so as to stop the laying of the queen, 

 and to compel the bees to bring all their har- 

 vest in the sections; but I know that our crops, 

 even when we raised comb honey, gave us more 

 profit with less work, and few(^r chancers of loss, 

 than the narrowing method to its partisans. A 

 queen, from July to August, can lay very little 

 in a small hive; and as tlie workersVlo not live, 

 on an average, more than 35 days during the 

 working season, the number of be«'s is very 

 much reduced in the fall. When winter comes, 

 . the population, which is small, suffeivs propor- 

 tionately more from tlie cold than a larger one. 

 In spring tlie bees are slow in recovei-ing a 

 number of workers sufficient for the harvest, 

 and their owner is compelled to narrow up the 

 brood-chamber to force them in the sections. 

 Thus the advocate of small hives turns in a cir- 

 cle. His colonies are small in winter and 

 spring, on account of his summer contraction: 

 then he is compelled to contract his hives again 

 to get a crop. On the contrary, not only the 

 queens in our large hives are not hindered in 

 their laying; but the workers have a large 

 room in which they lay up an abundance of the 

 best provisions. Then the population well fed,' 

 able to keep well warmed, coming out in spring 

 numerous and healthy, fill their hives with 

 workers ready for the honey-harvest. 



A successful Italian bee-keeper, who was 

 converted to the large hives by my writings, 

 wrote, last year, in UAplcoltore: "To obtain 

 good crops of honey you should prepare your 

 colonies during the preceding summer." Con- 

 traction does just the reverse. Our experience 

 on the question of the size of hives continues 

 the same. In our Lamont apiary (see Glean- 

 ings. January 15, page (iO), we have about 30 

 large Quinby hiv(>s and 23 ten-frame Lang- 

 stroth. Last October all our Quinby hives but 

 three had sufficient stores for winter, while 19 

 of the 23 Langstroth had to be fed. Vet we did 

 not take an ounce of hoiKiy from their brood- 

 chamher in summer. For several years we had 

 intended to transfer their colonies to Quinby 

 hives, and we have resolved to do it this spring. 



Uut, to return to my subject: Natural 

 swarming can be caused, also, by the death of 

 the queen during the honey season. Then the 

 workers, if they have eggs or young larvae, 

 raise several queens; and the first hatched, be- 

 ing hindered by the bees from killing her rivals, 

 is dissatisfied, and goes out with a swarm. This 

 swarming we designate as a "primary swarm 

 with young queen." Such swarming with 

 young queens amounts, on an average, to two 

 or three per cent of the number of our colonies. 

 It shows that it is impossible to prevent natu- 

 ral swarming completely, unless you watch youi- 



colonies to prevent them from replacing thcur 

 queens during the honey liarvest; but it con- 

 firms my theory, that swarming is always caus- 

 ed by the uncuxsiness of the bees. 



Hamilton. III., Apr. Ki. Charles Dadant. 



[Friend D., I am well aware there are many 

 things to be said in favor of large hives; and 

 where one works for extracted honey, as you 

 do, I rather think I should prefer them. As 

 this laige amount of room is needed, however, 

 during only a part of the year, there are some 

 vei'y good i'easons for (■nlarging, when needed, 

 by an upper story; and if we do this, it be- 

 hooves us to have our frames rather shallow. 

 This is why Langstroth decided on the frame 

 he has. Using ten combs belosv and ten moi'e 

 above, we have a hive about as large as mo^ 

 bee-keepers care for, and it comes in good com- 

 pact shape, pretty nearly a cube. It is true, the 

 boys have of late very strongly favored an 

 eight-frame hive; and for comb honey, where 

 we wish to oblige the bees to initall the surplus 

 into the boxes above, an (Mght-frarae hive may 

 not be so bad. And, again, for those who sell 

 bees and ship whole colonies, eight frames are 

 about all that is really necessary to ship and 

 pay express charges on. I have for years notic- 

 ed that bees do swarm, both in season and out 

 of season, when their home is not to their no- 

 tion. I have seen nuclei desert their hives, ap- 

 pai'ently because they were pestered by a nest 

 of ants. I have seen them do it, also, when I 

 could see no other reason than that the en- 

 trance had been carelessly left too small for 

 them to go out and in comfortably. They 

 swarm out when the hive is overcrowded, when 

 out of stores, and in glass observatory hives 

 when they have too much light, or if the sun 

 makes them uncomfortably hot. etc.] 



UNITING WEAK COLONIES. 



DOES UNITING 



PAY DITKING SPUING DWIN- 

 DLING? 



On page 290 of Gleanings for April 1st I see 

 that some spring dwindling is experienced at 

 the '• Home of the Honey-bees," and in this 

 connection I see that the editor advises uniting 

 weak colonies which have the " spring dwin- 

 dling," unless the weather is warm and pollen is 

 abundant. This is going back to the plan of 

 the "books" on bees of years ago, wh(u-e they 

 told us the time to unite was when it was discov- 

 ered that any two colonies were too weak to be 

 of use alone. There is no question but that the 

 uniting of two weak colonies to make one strong 

 one is profitable to the apiarist; still, that unit- 

 ing must make the one better than either of the 

 two would have been when the honey harvest 

 anives, or our labor of uniting is worse than 

 useless. That the uniting as proposed by the 

 editor does not, as a rule, make the united colo- 

 ny better at the end of three weeks than each 

 would have been if left separate, is why I ob- 

 ject to the advice there given. Years ago I ex- 

 perimented along this line to my entire satis- 

 faction, and I have put as many as seven such 

 "spring-dwindled " colonies into one hive, the 

 seven making a good rousing colony at the time, 

 and in a month all were dead; vvliile some, no 

 stronger than some of the best ones put into 

 this hive, which wer<' left separate, pulled 

 through and built up into colonies. The idea 

 seems to be, that, where two or more sucli colo- 

 nies are put together, the bees seem to think 

 that they can do something " big," and so work 

 themselves up to great activity in starting a 

 large lot of brood, which wears out the little vi- 

 tality there is left in them tx'fore enough young 



