JANUARY 1, 1916 



19 



W. H. Blackford, of Capay, Cal., started this yard in .lune, 1914, with one linmlred thrcc-liani:' 

 This June he increased to 238, buying 203 more. 



excluding' zinc of the right size, solder tin 

 divisions on one side in the top ; fold the 

 excluder under these, making the bottom, 

 and then fold up the rest of the zinc, mak- 

 ing the other side. Solder this side to the 

 divisions in a few j^laees. Turn the top 

 edges over to make a gi'oove for the tin 

 slide. Solder to each end of the cage a 

 loop to hook over a hook made of a wire 

 nail driven through the end-bar of the 

 frame. 



Crowd the bees of a six-frame nucleus on 

 to two frames and this frame with cages. 

 Put cells in against one wall, so as to leave 

 as much room as possible to prevent queens 

 being caught between the cell and wall, as 

 a few are liable to be. Note the age of the 

 cells in the queen-book. When the queens 

 hatch, take the cage around to the nucleus 

 hives and run the queens in with a very 

 little smoke. If an odd queen gets out of 

 a cage, remedy this by not using the divi- 

 sion she gets out of. When the first cells 

 are put in they may drop to the floor un- 

 less the sides of the cage are waxed. 



We had varying results with the smoke 

 method of queen introduction, but at our 

 last experiments we had as many losses 

 with cages as with the smoke. We still use 

 the smoke method and follow the directions 

 carefully, especially in regard to contract- 

 ing the entrances for a few days. 



We have found the method of queen- 



rearing given by A. C. Miller a great suc- 

 cess; but we have to start our cells in a 

 queenless hive. I use his record-book ; and 

 for ease and simplicity in operation it is 

 the best thing on the market. In queen- 

 rearing we have a record of, first, the start- 

 er liive, showing just when we gave the cells 

 and how many. An example of the other 

 records follows : 



QUEEX-REARER CELL-MINDER 



March 24, 1 bar, 15 cells March 28, 1 bar, 15 cells 

 April 1, 1 bar, 16 cells April 5, 1 bar, 16 cells 



HATCHING HIVE 



April 1, top cage, 15 cells. 

 April 8, middle cage, 16 cells, etc. 



The cell-minder is used between queen- 

 rearers, and the cell-cages when we are go- 

 ing full time with cages. We have but 

 three of these. Our nuclei are four in a 

 hive, on L. frames. Hives are numbered on 

 one side, and nuclei numbers, 1, 2, 3, 4, etc., 

 start from that side. 



Here is an example of our nucleus record : 

 No. 1. 



honey 



By 4 uns we mean " gave No. 4 in No. 1 

 nucleus 1 frame of unsealed brood;" 3s 

 means "gave No. 3 in No. 1 nucleus 1 frame 

 of sealed brood." F13 means queen failed 

 to mate ; 13, queen taken ; and 13, given 

 virgin on 13th. 



Tambourine, Queensland, Australia. 



