I8i>2 



tiLi:.\NL\(iS IN MKK CULTL'UE. 



lu'fs. Ami Tvc IxHMi n'pcaicdly boatfii in tliat 

 very maltiTof iiitrndiioiiiji (lucciis. 



Ii siMMiis to iiic tliat I'vi' had more failures (if 

 iatt' yi'Uis (liaii fonncily. ^'('al■s ajio I was 

 siioi't'ssfiii in I'ViTy instani'i' for a ionti time in 

 introdni'inff tiut'cns by tucrcly waitinf; till Ihc 

 colony lor pcrnaps it was always a niu-lcnsi had 

 coiunuMU'i'd to stai't qiit'iMi-oi'lls. and then sim- 

 ply plai'insz tln' ijimmmi witlionl any prcpaiaiion 

 wliatrvtT dii'i'Otly on one of th(> brood-combs 

 ainonsr the bees. Adam (Jrimm lold me he 

 thought it would not always succeed, and at 

 last it failed. 



Perhaps one reason of my success was the 

 fact of using nuclei. I think a strong colony 

 is mncli liarder to please with a new sovereign 

 than a weak one. Anotlier thing that makes a 

 big ditTerence. I think, is having all young bees. 

 Combine these two factors, weakness and 

 youth, and you have a pretty sure thing of it. 

 Set a hive on a new stand; put in it two frarues 

 of brood with adhering bees, and luy expeiience 

 is that aliuostany thing in the shape of a queen 

 will be kindly received after it has stood for 

 two days. Possibly it luay not be so much 

 because the be(\s are young as because they are 

 thoroughly dishmiitened. There they've stood 

 for two days with not a drop of honey coming 

 in. for all the field bees have gone back to the 

 old hive, and they feel themselves weak, hungry 

 orphans. Why shouldn't they want a mother? 



The plan I successfully followed in introduc- 

 ing four virgin queens after a journey across the 

 ocean, under the advice of "'A Hallamshire 

 Bee-keeper,'" might be successfully followed 

 with either laying or virgin queens. The bees 

 must be queenless for at least 48 hours, with 

 nothing from which by any possibility a queen 

 could be raised: then at dusk the queen drop-, 

 ped in from above as quietly as possible. Pos- 

 sibly that item, "at dusk." may be important. 

 There are then no strange bees prowling about 

 to make the bees suspicious of intruders. 



Although I have had success in introducing 

 queens by means of introducing-cages, there 

 have been some failures. Partly on that ac- 

 count (yet more, perhaps, because I am given 

 to hobbies, running entirely on one plan till 

 sometliing new switches me off in another 

 direction I I have not used cages this year, but 

 taken a dilTerent plan. Queens of my own 

 raising have been raised in nuclei generally. 

 Now. suppose a full colony becomes queenless, 

 and I want to give it the queen of a nucleus 

 having two frames of brood. The nucleus is in 

 an eight-frame hive, the same as the full col- 

 ony. Taking the full colony off its stand, I put 

 in its place the hive containing the nucleus 

 with its two frames, then I take one by one the 

 combs out of the old colony, shake off the bees 

 on the ground about four feet from the front of 

 the old stand until the hive is full of combs; 

 tlien the hive is covered up and left to itself, 

 and supers put on if necessary. The bees on 

 the ground will crawl or fly back in a subdued 

 spirit, with no desire to molest the queen. 

 There will be two frames still left with their 

 adhering bees in the old hive. When shaking 

 off the combs I reserved two in the best shape 

 to form a nucleus, and the hive with th(is<i two 

 combs and some bees is put on the stand pre- 

 viously occupied by the nucleus. If the stock 

 is good, and the right kind of queen-cells are 

 on the combs, nothing further is necessary- 

 otherwise I try to give them right away a good 

 queen-cell. 



Practically I have exchanged two combs of 

 the full colony with adhering bees for the two 

 combs of the' nucleus. So some one may ask 

 me if it is not simpler to take two frames out 

 of the full colony and put in their place the two 

 frames of the nucleus with bees and queen. I 



have done that a good many times, and gener- 

 ally with succe.-s; but failures occur often 

 enough to make it |)ay to take tiie (Jtlier plan 

 with its additional uoubh!. I do not ri-meinbei- 

 to have made a failuii' l)y the plan described; 

 but if I had a very valiuible queen to introduce. 

 I misjht not be willing to risk it. 



When I get an imported queen I generally 

 use the plan of hiiving two or more frames of 

 hatcliing l)i()od. if possible having no unsealed 

 brood. Uoolittle speaks of this plan, and seems 

 to think it's all right, except that sometimes 

 one may forget to bring it in at night, or it may 

 not be warm enough in the house, and so tnere's 

 a chance for chilling. I^et me tell you howl 

 manage so there is no danger of chilling. I 

 bore in the bottom of a hive a two-inch auger- 

 hole. On the inside of the hive I nail over this 

 hole a piece of wire cloth. Turning the hive 

 upside down I nail on the hole another piece of 

 wire cloth. Then this hive is placed over an- 

 other hive containing a strong colony. Nothing 

 is between the two hives, so that the heat from 

 the lower hive goes directly through the auger- 

 hole up into the hive above. In the upper hive 

 I put the frames of hatching brood, make sure 

 that every thing is bee-light, put the queen on 

 top of the frames, and quickly put on the cover. 

 In five days the upper hive is allowed an en- 

 trance large enough for the passage of one bee 

 at a time, and I have seen those tive-day-old 

 babies bringing in loads of pollen. In a few 

 days more the hive can be removed to a new 

 location. It would be better. I think, to have 

 the hole larger, so that the heat would pass up 

 more readily. The hole being doubly covered 

 with wire cloth, there is no chance for the bees 

 below to communicate with the ones above, so 

 there is no danger of their hatching mischief. 

 I have, however, sometimes used an upper hive 

 without any bottom-bnard. with a single sheet 

 of wire cloth between the two hives. 



Marengo. 111. C. C. Miller. 



TO PREVENT INCKEASE. 



A KEI'LY TO Dli. MII>LER, PAGE 484. 



I have just read Dr. Miller's article on page 

 484, six weeks after receiving it. He tries to 

 tell an Indiana correspondent how to prevent 

 increase: but I deem my method worth two or 

 three of the one he gives. His plan is objec- 

 tionable because it makes too much work, and 

 queens must be clipped, a thing which the 

 majority of bee-keepers do not practice or want 

 to practice. His method will also, I think, 

 interrupt honey-storing luore than mine. My 

 plan is, in substance, this: 



I nearly always have a few weak colonies in 

 the spring which I keep confined to three or five 

 combs. Often, about the beginning of the 

 honey-flow, I remove such a colony, which is 

 generally sitting near another and stronger 

 OIK!, to a new position, and let the stronger one 

 catch the flying bees. When a swarm issues I 

 hive it on live or six I'mpty frames, contracting 

 the hive with dummies and placing it on the 

 old stand, or the stand of some other colony 

 that has lately swarmed. Either that evening 

 or within a few days I remove the combs, bees 

 and all. in the old hive to one or more of those 

 weak colonies. When I get them all tilled up 

 by this means I add upper stories as needed, 

 and till them up with these combs after shaking 

 them in front of the hive containing the new 

 swarm. Th<! few bees that still adhere to the 

 comb 1 pay no attention to. For this purpose I 

 select .some of these same weak colonies, or 

 some other ones that, for any reason, may not 

 be able to go into sections. .Such colonies I run 



