1898 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



793 



seem to lose their vim, and start fewer cells, 

 and build them smaller. 



By remembering that the egg usually hatch- 

 es the third day, the larva is sealed the sixth 

 day, or nine days from the laying of the egg, 

 and that it is sealed over seven days, and that 

 the queen is hatching in sixteen da\s from the 

 egg, there is no watching to do. Queens may 

 be pulled on the fifteenth day, and let run in 

 at the entrance, but I prefer to cut the cells on 

 that day and insert them between the top-bars 

 of the frames, without marring the combs, and 

 let them hatch in the hive. 



Please do not think I am trying to offer ad- 

 vice to the professional queen-breeder I have 

 no such aspiration. I have written this chap- 

 ter from my own experience, for the benefit of 

 my busy brother bee-keepers who wish to re- 

 queen their ajjiaries with as little outlay of la- 

 bor and time as possible. 



Santa Barbara, Cal. 



[I believe Mr. Wood can produce queens as 

 he says. But one great advantage of the Doo- 

 little cells is, they are stronger, will stand 

 rougher manipulation, and can be spaced off 

 on a stick just the distance most convenient 

 for handling ; and, after all, the making of 

 the cell-cups and the subsequent fastening 

 and grafting is not so fussy as one might sup- 

 pose. When we first began working on the 

 Doolittle plan it seemed to me it was utterly 

 intolerable, especially as I thought we could 

 get the bees to do for us that which we might 

 attempt to do at a greater expense ; but I 

 must confess that the actual working-out of 

 the plan is simpler and more expeditious than 

 it actually reads on paper. But I do most 

 heartily indorse the idea at the opening of Mr. 

 Wood's article, of making the bees save their 

 owner work as far as possible. The first time 

 I ever attempted to handle a two-horse plow I 

 thought it was necessary to drag the great big 

 tool around each end of the furrow. My Ca- 

 nuck brother-in-law, John, let me proceed in 

 this way for a few furrows, and then showed 

 me how much easier it was for me to let the 

 horses do the dragging — that is, deposit the 

 plow at just about the point I desired to begin 

 the new furrow. — Ed.] 



FROM THE EGG TO THE BEE. 



Observatory-hive Work. 



BY FR. GREINER. 



In regard to the question, " How much time 

 is required to bring a bee from the egg to ma- 

 turity ? " bee-keepers have not all been of one 

 mind, so it seems, although our bee-books say 

 21 days, or perhaps '20 to 21 days. I have seen 

 it stated by some one recently, that 19 days is 

 the allotted time ; but, generally speaking, 21 

 days is commonly considered the usual time. 

 Our friend Doolittle speaks of the matter in 

 the Sept. loth issue ; and when /le makes a 

 statement of that kind, there is no room for 

 doubt. I made some observations along the 

 same line last summer, and I might add some 



minor points to what he says, that may be of 

 interest, so I will tell you about it. 



To begin with, the hive I used to make my 

 experiments with is of a peculiar construction, 

 the ends being composed of sections clamped 

 together with Van Deusen hive-clamps in such 

 a manner that, by removing or adding such 

 sections, the hive may be contracted or ex- 

 panded so as to accommodate any number of 

 isrood-frames from one to ten or more. The 

 sides of the hive aie glass. A large pane on 

 each side shows the whole side of a comb next 

 to it. When a number of combs are used, the 

 hive may be pulled apart anywhere without 

 giving the bees a moment's warning, thus 

 quickly gaining access to the center or any 

 part of the hive at any time, perhaps surpris- 

 ing them. 



Not wishing to experiment with a onecomb 

 colony for various reasons, I established, Aug. 

 1st, a four-comb one in this hive by simply 

 taking from a very populous colony f )ur brood- 

 combs with bees adhering, adding some more 

 bees by shaking from two other combs all the 

 bees that would naturally be on them. Our 

 thus newly formed colony was carried to a 

 new location, giving the bees a place by the 

 window in my reading-room, facing southeast, 

 and allowing them to fly through a hole cut 

 through a two inch piece of pine inserted un- 

 der the slightly raised sash. The bees were 

 the genuine black, or native, and I gave them 

 a very light-colored Italian queen caged in a 

 common w^ire- cloth cage that I placed in one 

 of the lower corners of an outside frame from 

 which I had previously removed a piece of 

 drone comb. The queen was liberated by the 

 bees the first day after forming the colony ; 

 and when, a few days afterward, I pulled the 

 hive apart so as to remove the queen -cage, I 

 saw her walking quietly among the bees on 

 one of the central combs. After the removal 

 of the cage the bees filled out the space again, 

 with drone comb, as I had expected and hoped. 



About this time we were having the very 

 warmest kind of weather. Buckwheat was 

 yielding some honey, and I kept feeding mod- 

 erately besides. Aug. 13th I caught my queen 

 in the act of laying eggs in worker-cells as 

 well as in the recently constructed drone-cells, 

 right in the outside comb next to the glass, 

 and every such cell was immediately marked 

 with colored ink on the pane of glass. I then 

 kept close watch of those cells. It bothered 

 me, many times, to see and distinguish things, 

 but I received great benefit from a strong 

 lamp with reflector, and by using a mirror 

 with which I could throw the sunlight direct- 

 ly on the comb. In due time I saw the little 

 larvEe, and noticed from day to day the in- 

 crease in their size. At no time did I see a 

 larva stretched out, or, in other words, occu- 

 pying a cell lengthwise. They always lay 

 curled up in their respective cells. A part of 

 the worker larvfe were capped over in 8 days 

 and 14 hours ; all of them within 9 days. No 

 changes could be observed on the now capped 

 cells for eleven days. Sept. 2, at 9 a.m., I 

 discovered some bees emerging from those 

 cells in which I saw the queen lay eggs Aug. 

 13th at 7 A. M., making the time of growth 



