8()4 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Oct. 1.5. 



stiain that would be valuable in this respect. 

 Because many have failed is no reason that 

 some one else may not succeed. It's worth 

 much trying. 



The Punic queen that I succeeded in get- 

 ting to lay seemed to be doing a good business, 

 but suddenly disappeared. I don't know why, 

 and the bees have raised a successor from her 

 brood. The curious part of it is. that, of the 

 progeny of the Punic queen (she was fertilized 

 in my apiary), not one in .lOO shows any black 

 blood. A careless observer might readily take 

 them for pure Italians. I still think it was a 

 big thing to get a virgin queen from England. 

 and get her to laying. 



ftUESTIONS ANSWERED. 



INTRODUCING QUEENS TO COLONIES THAT HAVE 

 BEEN LONG QUEENLESS. 



Some time in August I sent a queen to a party 

 in Canada; and in writing to me, telling of his 

 losing her in trying to introduce her, he inci- 

 dentally mentioned that he introduced her to a 

 colony that had been queenless for three or four 

 weeks, and asked what I supposed was the 

 trouble. I suppose the colony had a queen, or 

 something it called a queen. I do not know 

 whether or not he had given this colony un- 

 sealed brood at diiferent times during this time 

 that they were queenless; but from the tone of 

 his letter I should judge that he had not. The 

 object in answering this question in Glean- 

 ings is to particularly emphasize this thought: 

 DoiVt ever try to introduce a queen to a colony 

 which has been long queenless, without first 

 giving them unsealed brood, so as to knoui to a 

 certai7ity that they are <iueenless. According 

 to the many letters of the past, in regard to loss 

 of queens in introduction, I judge that more 

 queens are lost by trying to introduce them to 

 supposedly queenless colonies than from all 

 other causes put together. ''But,'" says one, 

 " how shall I know to a certainty that a colony 

 has or has not a queen, by simply putting in 

 brood?" As far as I have had experience, a 

 queenless colony will always start queen-cells 

 on brood given them, unless they have laying 

 workers, in which case they do not always cou- 

 sider themselves as queenless, and, as a rule, 

 one might about as well tiy to get a (jueen into 

 a colony which has a queen as to tr\' to intro- 

 duce one to a colony having laying workers. If 

 a colony builds queen-cells you may know that 

 it is queenless, and that, if the right amount of 

 care is used, a fei'tile queen may be successfully 

 introduced to it. But if any colony does not 

 start queen-cells on brood given them, it may 

 be known that it is a dangerous undertaking to 

 try to introduce a queen to such a colony. 

 Don't let us as a bee-fraternity be longer igno- 

 rant or heedless on this matter, for enough mon- 

 ey and fine queens have already been sacrificed 

 .at the shrine of ignorance and carelessness. 



SECTIONS I'AIiALI.EI- WITH FRAMES. 



Another writes, telling how he is about to 

 ■make some new hives in which he desires to 

 liave the sections in the cases go crosswise of 

 the brood-frames, and \sishes me to tell in 

 Gleanings whether I think the bees will do as 

 well in them wh(>n worked in this way as they 

 do where they go with the frames, as is the 

 usual custom. As far as the bees are concerned 

 or the amount of honey produced, it makes no 

 difference which way the sections run to the 

 brood -frames where the Langs troth bee-space 

 is used, as I have repeatedly proven to my sat- 

 isfaction. Where a continuous passageway is 

 used, necessity compels us to place the sections 



parallel with the brood-frames. There is one 

 important item in this mattei-, however, which 

 makes it very desirable to have the sections 

 run parallel with the frames, and that is the 

 matter of having all hives pitch toward the 

 entrance. This is almost a necessity to keep 

 the water out of the hive, both as regards rain 

 at all times, and the condensed moisture fiom 

 the bees" breath during the winter and early 

 spring months. If hives do not slant toward 

 the entrance, Injury is worked, not only to the 

 bees, but to the hives; for a hive will not last 

 nearly as long which stands level as will one 

 that pitches enough to the front to run off all 

 water. If such pitch is used and the sections 

 go crosswise of the frames, the combs in the 

 sections will be run from one section into the 

 bottom of the ne.xt one. for bees always build 

 their combs perpendicular; or if the frames run 

 crosswise to the entrance, and the hive is pitch- 

 ed toward the entrance, as it always should be, 

 then the combs will not be built true in the 

 frames. Having hives pitch toward the en- 

 trance also helps the bees much in cleaning the 

 bottoms of their hives and keeping them clean; 

 also in defending themselves from robbers and 

 other insects. For these i-easons I should pre- 

 fer to have the sections run parallel with the 

 frames, if such a thing were possible. 



PARTLY FILLED SECTIONS. 



Still another writes, saying: "I am about 

 having my partly filled sections fixed up by the 

 bees preparatory to next season's operations. 

 This I do by uncapping the sealed part of the 

 honey and placing them over colonies which 

 need feeding. After the bees have removed the 

 honey, during my leisure houi'S this fall and 

 winter I wish to put them in my cases so as to 

 have all in readiness for another harvest when 

 it comes, so as to have no fussing with these in 

 my hurry next summer. fShould the supers be 

 entirely filled with these sections, or partly 

 filled with new? If the latter, what part of the 

 super is the best location for the sections con- 

 taining the comb?" 



My way of doing this would be- to divide the 

 number of sections by the number of colonies 

 which I expected to have next year to produce 

 comb honey, and place the quotient in each 

 case, placing the partly filled ones in the center 

 and the othei' on each side. Used in this way 

 as " bait'" sections, these partly filled sections 

 are of gi-eat value, and will bring you a greater 

 interest than money in the bank; while if all 

 were put on top of a few hives they would not 

 be of nearly so much value. If you have more 

 paitly filled sections than enough to make one 

 tier through the center of each section-case, 

 then I should place in the middle tier as before, 

 then a tier on each side of this of the new sec- 

 tions, then more of the partly filled sections, 

 and so on. alternating till the section-case is 

 filled. In this way the bees will be at work 

 throughout the whole case, almost before you 

 know it. G. M. Doolitlle. 



Borodino, N. Y., Oct. 5. 



[I indorse emphatically what you say in re- 

 gard to introducing to queenless colonies: and 

 I wish that every ABC scholar might read 

 over those italics two or three times. The 

 meanest colony, according to our experience, to 

 introduce a queen to is one that has been queen- 

 less long enough so that there is a possibility or 

 a probability of a vii'gin queen being in the 

 hive somewhere. They will invariably kill the 

 introduced queen, no matter how valuable she 

 may be. and take instead any little old black 

 virgin that may happen to be lurking in the 

 hive. In the directions we have been sending 

 out for introducing queens for the past year or 



