June 15. 1911 



355 



of oi)inion on both sides of the great water 

 is about the same. — Ed.] 



Most of the logic, p. 262, about eight and 

 ten frame hives is all right, Mr. Editor, but 

 one thing is not. That two-thirds of hives 

 now sold are ten-frame does not prove they 

 are best, but it proves that you have told 

 beginners they are best. Hives are sold 

 chiefly to those w'ho are more or less begin- 

 ners, and beginners take your word for \* hat 

 is best. Mind you, I don't say your advice 

 is wrong in this case. I changed from ten 

 to eight frames mainly to be in fashion. If 

 it v>ere to do over again I would likely stay 

 Ly the ten frames. 



The statement, ])age 290, that breakage 

 and leakage in shipping comb honey aver- 

 ages 20 per cent is rather startling. I had 

 supposed one per cent was pretty bad. 

 [Doubtless one per cent would be a high 

 average of breakage for you. ship])ing as you 

 do in carloads, and looking after the pack- 

 ing yourself. The 20 per cent is based on 

 the average of shipments of comb honey 

 from e\ erybody alike. But even when the 

 comb honey is well put up you would be 

 surprised to' see the amount of breakage that 

 takes place in less than carload shii)ments. 

 —Ed.] 



"The queen in a natural state lives 

 about five years." That's the provokingly 

 brief statement of the British Bee Journal, 

 p. IHO. I wish it would enlarge a little upon 

 it, and tell us what is the natural state, and 

 how long she lives in the a\erage hive un- 

 der average conditions. [Five years is a 

 long time in our locality for a queen-bee to 

 live. We seldom have a queen live more 

 than four years; and the average in our 

 yards i)robably would not run much over 

 three years. These figures are based on the 

 assumption that the queens are mothers of 

 full colonies, and lay eggs for a big force of 

 bees. — Ed.] 



Those FiarREs, p. 326, set me to figur- 

 ing. If a queen lays BOOO eggs daily from 

 May 25 to .tune 10, she will in that 16 days 

 fill 8 frames full all but a rim of }4 inch at 

 top and at each side. If she lays daily 4000 

 eggs she will in 16 days fill 9}4 frames en- 

 tirely full. But notice, that's only for 16 

 days, and a hive must hold what a queen 

 will lay for 21 days. Besides, frames are 

 never filled without a considerable margin, 

 for at least some of the combs. If we allow 

 an average margin of one inch at toj) and 

 sides, it will take 14 frames to accommodate 

 a queen that averages ooOO daily for 21 days. 

 Xo doubt many a good (jueen is badly 

 cramped in a ten-frame hive during the 

 height of the breeding season. 



The season is rather unusual. Weather 

 seemed backward for some time, but the 

 second week in May brought a number of 

 days with the mercury up near 90. Bees 

 stayed in the cellar till April 18, and there 

 was just a little question whether Ihey could 

 build up for the harvest. But they built uj) 

 straight along, and by May 10 we had to 

 hustle to get in the bottom-racks, for- comb 



was being built down below the bottom- 

 bars. I think the colonies are stronger 

 throughout the whole ajnary than I ever 

 knew them before at the same date. May 

 18. A number of second stories have been 

 needed to accommodate the increasing 

 brood. Just now they might .be better off 

 if they were all in ten-frame hives. A num- 

 ber of swarms have been rei)orted in this lo- 

 cality — something that I never knew before 

 up to the middle of May. 



That item about old comb, p. 293, looks 

 as if the printer had been taking liberties 

 with it. Cells worked over into drone-cells 

 because old, and then worthless for breed- 

 ing, because filled with old pollen, rather 

 tangles me. I can't understand how there 

 is room to enlarge a worker-cell into a drone- 

 cell; and if it should be enlarged why should 

 it be filled with i)ollen? Bees are not in 

 the habit of jnitting pollen in drone-cells. 

 I can easily understand that old combs may 

 have holes gnawed in them by mice, and 

 that the bees may fill the holes with drone 

 comb, and, of course, the comb is then ob- 

 jectionable. But that cells become "im- 

 perfect" merely because old, and that old 

 W'Orker-cells are enlarged, rather gets me. 

 (The usual objection is that cells become 

 smaller with age.) Having as old combs as 

 I have had, and as many of them, it seems 

 I should have noticed it if such things hap- 

 pen as stated, but I never have. I'm reacly 

 to believe whatever .1. PI Crane says; and if 

 he really wrote that just as it is printed, I 

 wish he Would tell us more about it. [Xo 

 mistake in the copy. It is up to Bro. 

 Crane. — P]d.] 



Dandelions seem on the increase every 

 year, and just now the bees seem to have 

 more than they can do to take care of them. 

 This change in the dandelion crop has had 

 a very important effect in the matter of 

 queeii-rearing. Formerly a queen reared be- 

 fore the white-clover harvest was so likely 

 to be poor that no cells were allowed to ma- 

 ture before that time. Xow dandelions al- 

 low good queens to be reared about a month 

 earlier. A few dandelion queens reared two 

 years ago have done excellent service. Of 

 course, it will not do to rear queens in the 

 break between dandelions and clover. 

 [Dandelions are also a great help in this lo- 

 cality in our early queen-rearing oi)erations. 

 But, "doctor, you speak as though the dande- 

 lion queens" and those reared during the 

 wdiite-clover harvest would be better than 

 those reared before. What is the matter 

 with cjueens reared under the im])ulse of 

 scientific feeding? The man who rears 

 queens for us in large numbers says he gets 

 the best and most uniform results in cell- 

 building from colonies scientifically fed 

 when no honey-flow is on, because he can 

 then regulate the supi)ly of feed. During 

 the honey-flow the bees become excited, 

 and will "sometimes neglect the important 

 business of queen-rearing. This is particu- 

 larly so when the clover flow is very heavy. 

 —Ed.] 



