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THE PREVENTION OF SWARMING 



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J) r e V e utioii of 

 swarming is (o 

 enlarge the en- 

 entrances of the 

 wintei' cases 

 wlien the bees 

 begin to cluster 

 (Iowa in the bridges in early April. The next 

 is to add a super of nnniber-oue brood-combs 

 without the queen-excluder as soon as the 

 original brood-chamber is Vvcll filled with 

 bees, on a day too cool for bees to tiy. We 

 do not wait for the combs to be filled with 

 brood and lioney. This is the last of April 

 or early in May, ;ind the fact that all are 

 still protected lay winter cases allows us to 

 super more liberally without fear of change- 

 able weather. The extra combs given at 

 this time should all be dark; but, it such 

 are limited, there may be dark ones in the 

 middle of the super and light ones at the 

 outside. The queen generally goes up into 

 these quite readily and starts a new brood- 

 nest. Possibly the fact that conditions are 

 similar to those of a newly hived swarm 

 tends to a state of greater contentment. At 

 any rate, if she has ability she develops her 

 new quarters upstairs with great vigor, and 

 we are saved the swarm of bees in May for 

 which we would not trade a good-sized fork- 

 ful of hay. If the ancient poet had said 

 that a good strong colony in May is worth 

 a load of hay, and to prevent swarming in 

 June is worth a whole cabinet of silver- 

 ware, he might have been guilty of "vers 

 lihir,'' l)ut he would li!i\-e taught good bee- 

 keeping. 



Extra Supers Given Early. 

 We often get a honey How early in May 

 that would drive the queen down again by 

 filling her new brood-chamber with honey, 

 if we did not add an excluder and an ex- 

 tracting super on top of the double brood- 

 chamber. Again, we -do not wait for a 

 crowded condition, but keep on supering 

 as long as the colony has bees to go in and 

 sit on Uic conihs if nothing else. We try to 

 forestall any clustering out. Contentment 

 in the hive is the keyword to swarm preven- 

 tion, and the secret of this is room for 

 brood, stores, (iinl ha-t^. The first two are 

 often stressed in articles on this subject, 

 but seldom the latter. There should be 

 space inside for all hands to go in, even 

 when it rains, and ventilation so they /'"/// 

 go in when it is hot. Usually by the time 

 the queen has had her u])stairs ai)artment 

 for three weeks or four at the outside, she 

 has forgotten the old one downstairs and 

 it is time to ask her to iiioxc <lo\vn again. 

 If we neglect this, the lower set of combs 

 is ruined with an excess of pollen. We can- 

 not wait for the beginning of the clover 

 fiow as is so often advised. As a matter 

 of fact we find something profitable to do to 

 ea(di colonv almost everv eight to ten davs 



Importance of Comfort and Con- 

 tentment of the Bees. The Swarm- 

 ing Problem a Blessing in Disguise 



By Moriey Pettit 



(|ii(M'n - clijipmg 

 starts — the last 

 week in Ap;jl, 

 if' the seiison i.; 

 early as it is- 

 this year, till it 

 is all ov(M' in 

 the fall. And 

 we find that it 

 gives best results to super as the colony de- 

 velops to prevent crowding or clustering- 

 out, regardless of the filling of the supers, 

 until we know definitely that the flow is 

 over or nearly so. In every case the fresh 

 super is i)laced next to the brood-chamber. 

 Now if supering is attended to as 1 have 

 tried to indicate, and a little in (idniiirr of 

 Uir ii(C(J III each case; and if the queen has 

 been allowed to "swarm" upstairs to a 

 nice set of dark worker combs and then 

 jilaced downstairs on her old combs while 

 they are still in the best of condition, and 

 before the brood has all emerged from them, 

 we feel that we have done all that the colony 

 can reasonably expect of us to make them 

 contented in the old home. Besictes giving 

 ample clustering and storing space we have 

 twice gi\en brood-chamber conditions 

 Avhich resemble, to some extent, those of 

 a freshly hived swarm. 



The second time, the brood is hoisted to 

 the top of the hive. On the next visit this 

 bi'ood is in prime condition to make nuclei 

 for queen-rearing and increase. If not 

 needed for either, it stays right there to add 

 its bees to the colony and then be used for 

 honey stoi'age. Have you a sentiment 

 against using brood-combs for honey? Our 

 customers have none. And they buy from 

 us year after year. And what about the 

 queen-cells? We use some of the best of 

 them for nuclei when we know the stock 

 is good, and destroy the others. Perhaps 

 we could safely neglect them, but we hate 

 to take the chance. 



Keep Colomes Contented. 

 I have outlined above our method of pre- 

 venting swarming. It is a method which 

 is effectual in the majority of cases. To 

 disrupt violently the colony organization is 

 as repugnant to us as we feel it is to the 

 bees. It is to be resorted to only in ex- 

 treme cases, and in our system is seldom 

 worse than that of leaving a full colony 

 queenless from one visit to the next. With 

 all deference to successful beekeepers who 

 practice such things, I w^ould liken the sys- 

 tem of treating a whole yard at once to 

 rai)ine and violence like, ''shooking" or 

 ' ' I)emareeing, ' ' to a surgeon who would 

 amputate the right leg of every patient in 

 a large hosi)ital because sonu^ of them 

 needed such treatment and others might. 



We go thru our colonies every six to 

 eight or nine days. This periodical examina- 

 tion serves a number of purposes and has a 

 bearing on the pievention of swarming. By 

 means of it supering is attendcMJ to, and 



