1182 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Nov. 15 



the hives for a considerable time; but with 

 me I prefer to remove the board in order to 

 finish up the operation and give the young 

 queen full sway at once. One important 

 point to be considered in using this plan is 

 that, should the young queen be lost on her 

 mating-flight, as you have the old queen to 

 fall back upon no great daniage will result. 

 I consider the requeening feature a most 

 important one, as I have seldom known a 

 colony with a young queen to make much 

 effort at swarming, and in this locality not 

 one colony in a thousand will swarm after 

 this manipulation. 



protector insures acceptance. Proceed in 

 this way through the entire apiary; and by 

 the time the young queens are ready to 

 mate you will have all bad drones behind 

 zinc, and the fine queens will be almost sure 

 to meet the right drones. 



In this article I have but barely outlined 

 the possibilities of this simple device and 

 system; in fact, I am constantly finding out 

 more about it, and expect to be able to im- 

 prove it in several ways; but as it is now, I 

 think it far ahead of any other non-swarm- 

 ing device that I know of. 



When rearing queens for requeening, a 

 cell-bar containing the Doolittle dipped cups 

 can be'used if desired. Simply use the roy- 

 al jelly found in the natural cell-cups, to 

 prime the artificial cups, and then transfer 

 your choice larvae to them and place in be- 

 tween the combs of brood, and you will get 

 as fine cells as by any method in existence. 



In conclusion I will say that it is my prac- 

 tice, when running for extracted honey, 

 either to give more room or extract as soon 

 as the young queens begin laying. All will 

 keep this in mind, as a crowded house is oft- 

 en a prolific cause of trouble. 



Vigo, Texas. 



When running for comb honey I have 

 found it best to use starters in the lower 

 hive, B, just the same as in brushed swarm- 

 ing, except giving no frame of brood; but 

 shake the old queen in front of the entrance 

 F, and put the case of sections directly on 

 hive B, and the dividing-board over the sec- 

 tions, and hive A on top of all. In this way 

 it will be necessary to give a mature queen- 

 cell from some other source, as the constant 

 desertion of bees from hive A will leave it 

 in poor condition to rear good cells. In this 

 case it will, of course, be necessary to un- 

 cover the flight- hole E to allow the young 

 queen to mate, after which the old queen 

 can be removed and the »rhole force reunit- 

 ed, or you can allow the bees to remove the 

 old queen by simply exchanging hives a day 

 or two before taking away the dividing- 

 board. 



There is still another manipulation possi- 

 ble; and if it is desirable to requeen from 

 choice stock, or to change stock, I recom- 

 mend it in preference to the above plan; 

 and as the colonies having mostly drones 

 will be zinc-covered, there will be but little 

 trouble from undesirable drones flying. In 

 this last operation proceed as in the first, 

 but give four frames of as nearly sealed 

 brood as can be gotten; and as soon as cells 

 are well under construction remove the lar- 

 vae in them and graft with larvae from the 

 desired stock. A few colonies treated thus 

 will furnish all the choice cells you need; 

 and when you manipulate a colony, give one 

 of these choice cells. I advise the use of 

 cell-protectors, for bees will sometimes de- 

 stroy cells, even when queenless; and a cell- 



THE TRUTH ABOUT CAUCASIAN BEES. 



My First Season's Experience with them. 



BY D. EVERETT LYON, PH.D. 



In the American Bee- keeper for October I 

 notice that the new Caucasian bees are re- 

 ferred to as "the most worthless race of 

 bees that has ever been offered to the Amer- 

 ican public; " and lest a false impression be 

 given concerning this noble race I desire to 

 enter a most emphatic protest. 



Without hard feeling, I am inclined to be- 

 lieve pretty strongly that the gentleman 

 who gave the above characterization of Cau- 

 casians is entirely ignorant of an acquaint- 

 ance with them, or else he never possessed 

 the pure Caucasians. 



Will the writer of the above-quoted para- 

 graph tell us whether he has actually han- 

 dled and studied the habits of Caucasians? 

 or is he taking the opinion of some one else? 

 My experience with them is just the oppo- 

 site, and I know that they are not a worthless 

 race of bees, but, on the contrary, a valua- 

 ble acquisition to present valuable races. 



Mr. Frank Benton, the government apia- 

 rist at Washington, in a letter to the writer, 

 states that they are the gentlest of all races; 

 are good honey-gatherers, holding their own 

 with the Italians in this respect, and can be 

 manipulated without smoke, veil, or gloves. 



This season I gave them a thorough trial 

 as to gentleness — pulled hive-lid off, jarred 

 the frames, and, even when they were being 

 robbed during late fall, due to carelessness 

 in leaving some honey exposed, even under 

 these conditions I shook them from their 

 combs in front of their hives to test their 



