1905 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURR 



361 



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PRATT'S "BABY NUCLEI." 



Some of Pratt's New Kinks; Should the Honey- 

 Producer Attempt to Rear his Queens or 

 Buy Them ? 



BY E. R. ROOT. 



A short time ago Mr. E. L. Pratt pub- 

 lished a pamphlet on the general subject of 

 "Baby Nuclei," in the latest style of the 

 printer's art, a good deal after the style of 

 the celebrated Roycroft publications. In 

 this little work Mr. Pratt brings together 

 all of his latest practices on this subject of 

 miniature clusters of bees. 



I have already explained in these columns 

 how to get queen-cells and hatched virgins 

 in quantity. This is easy. But up until 

 lately it has been neither easy nor cheap to 

 get the virgins mated. The problem is 

 now satisfactorily solved. 



In his introductory chapter he says that 

 one small section of comb and ten bees, 

 properly harnessed, will surround the virgin 



f 



Fig. 1. 



queen with all the environments tending to 

 I'.iatei'nity flight; but that twenty-five or 

 fifty will do better. Much over a small tea- 

 cupful to each mating-box he believes would 

 be a positive disadvantage. While one can 

 use 4^ sections for frame, yet his ideal frame 

 is of such a size that six of them will fit 

 inside of a regular Langstroth frame. These 

 ' ' baby ' ' frames have no ears or projections, 

 but are secured to the cover by means of 

 two bent staples. 



Last season the Root Co. tried in its queen- 

 rearing yards a "baby" nucleus box that is 

 practically the same as the Pratt— so near 

 it, in fact, that I think it but fair to say it 

 is the same thing. The illustrations accom- 

 panying show its general construction. 



The little hive consists of a box made of 

 J-inch stuff, 3| inches wide, 6 inches long, 

 and 4J inches deep, inside measure. The 



cover is made of material of the same thick- 

 ness, with V-shaped channel-irons driven 

 over the ends into corresponding saw- cuts to 

 prevent warping. Through the center of 



Fig. 2. 



this cover is bored a hole of just the right 

 size to admit a wooden cell-cup to which the 

 bees have built a queen-cell. The frames, 

 as explained, have no ears or projections on 

 the top-bars, and, in fact, are nothing more 

 nor less than four-piece sections i wide, 5| 

 X4, or of just the right size so that six of 

 them will fill a standard Langstroth frame. 

 If these little frames had projecting ears 

 they could not be fitted into the larger ones, 

 so other means must be provided whereby 

 they can be secured in a hanging position. 

 Mr. Pratt devised bent staples, using one of 



them at each diagonally opposite corner of 

 the top-bar. We prefer to use' one large 

 one, the same projecting to the center line 

 of the top-bar, for the reason that the 



