254 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Closer view of Mr. Harvey's apiary, shovring the vcay western producers take off honey during a good 

 flow. A few of the bees are unoked out, the super .iprked off. and then stood on end to allow the revst of 

 the bees to come out at their leisure. This plan can be followed only during a honey flow. 



is no wizardry about his methods unless the 

 careful, thoughtful, methodical worker is a 

 wizard. 



Mr. and Mrs. Harvej' sjiend their winters 

 in California, as do quite a number of other 

 western beemen and families. Once a bee- 

 man goes there for the winter he goes back 

 year after vear if the crop warrants it. He 

 told me he' had made from $3000 to $5000 



per year from his bees regularly, although 

 he has suffered very much from winter and 

 spring losses and from poisoning of his 

 bees by careless people spraying fruit-trees 

 while in bloom. Would that we might have 

 more beemen like l\'Lr. Harvey. He is help- 

 ing to raise the standards of beekeeping, 

 not by his preaching but by his practice. 

 Boulder, Col. 



REARING GOOD QUEENS 



BY R. P. holtb;rmann 



From an address given hy Mr. Roy Eeet, Black River, N. Y., at a convention of the Jefferson and St. 



Lawrence County Beekeepers 



In Jefferson and St. Lawrence counties 

 live some of the best beekeepers in New 

 York ; and the past poor season in that pari 

 of the State did not appear to dampen their 

 beekeeping ardor in the least. 



Mr. Roy Keet, of Black River, N. Y., gave 

 the following on reai'ing good queens: 



A good queen is, in my estimation, the 

 most important factor of success in bee- 

 keeping. One may be the fortunate owner 

 of all modern equipment and still not have 

 good queens. Good queens are as essential 

 in the ajiiary as are good cows in the herd. 

 Success depends on the quality of the queen. 



It may be well to explain here what I 

 mean by a good queen. She must be of 

 good stock; slie should be reared under the 

 best possible conditions, which I shall name 

 later on; she should be strong and proUIie; 



she should lay her eggs in a compact clus- 

 ter, and not scatter them; her bees should 

 be gentle; and in these days of brood dis- 

 eases she must be purely mated. I will add 

 further from my experience, I believe she 

 should be a pure Italian. 



METHOD OF REARING. 



First, we must choose the colony for our 

 work. This should not be a difficult mat- 

 ter, for this colony need not be the strong- 

 est in the yard. One having six combs of 

 brood with plenty of bees to cover them 

 will answer. Having selected the colony, 

 we first remove the queen. If she is a valu- 

 able one Ave retain her in a nucleus for fu- 

 ture use. Fi-equently, under such circum- 

 stances, 1 build up this nucleus into a full 

 colony for winter. We next I'etnove as mucli 

 of the unsealed brood as possible. In a ten- 



