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TRANSFERRING TO GOOD COMBS. 



How can the bees be transferred from boxes, or it may be from combs, 

 into a modern hive, with the least possible trouble? This question is fre- 

 quently asked the Department these days, indicating that a real live interest 

 is being taken in modern beekeeping, for unless combs are movable and 

 easily removable from the hive it is impossible to follow modern methods. 

 Knowing the many duties and cares of the average beekeeper in the summer 

 months, the inspectors do not feel it advisable to recommend a system of 

 direct transferring, which consists in cutting the old combs out of the boxes 

 and fastening them into the frames of the new hive. One of the inspector* 

 has had quite an extensive experience with the direct method, and he does 

 not feel like advising a novice to undergo what might turn out to be a rather 

 trying ordeal. To his mind an indirect method, that is to say one by which 

 the bees are gradually worked over into the new hive, but the combs are 

 left behind, is far better adapted to the conditions of the average man. 



First let us take* the case where the bees are in regular hives, but th 

 combs are in so chaotic a condition that it is impossible to remove a frame 

 from the hive. This is a rather easy case. The beekeeper provides himself 

 with a new hive, one in which the frames are furnished with full sheets of 

 foundation, also a queen excluder. When the bees are so strong that they 

 occupy the full width of the hive, which should be about the first week in 

 May, remove the cover of the old hive, and place the new one on top of the 

 brood-chamber, then replace the cover. The bees will soon take possession 

 of the addition, in fact if there be a good flow of nectar from fruit blossom* 

 they will draw out, that is build, new combs very rapidly. Almost as fat 

 as these are made the queen will lay eggs in the cells. The problem for the 

 beekeeper at this stage of the proceedings is to pen the queen in the top- 

 chamber so as to prevent her laying below in the old one. So, about a week 

 after the new hive has been given he should lift one of the middle frames 

 and look into the cells. If he sees eggs or larvae it is proof that the queen 

 is laying above. We will suppose that these are found. The queen is in 

 one of the chambers, but we do not know which. If little or no smoke hae 

 been used she will probably be above, but if much was blown down the 

 frames she is almost certain to have run down into the lower chamber to 

 escape the deluge. We will replace the frames and wait till next day, so 

 that normal conditions will reign. On the second visit we take the queen- 

 excluder along and lean it against the hive where it will be easily got when 

 wanted. Now smoke the bees through the entrance, and wait a minute or 

 two. The smoke will not only subdue the bees, but will tend to drive the 

 queen above should she happen to be in the bottom hive. Next, without 

 removing the cover, lift the upper division away to one side, clap the ex- 

 cluder on the lower hive, then restore the top story to its former position. 



We do not know for certain where the queen is but tte charges are 

 greatly in favor of the assumption that she is above the excluder, but in 

 three days we can learn where she really is by examining the middle frames 

 in the top story. An egg hatches in three days after it is laid, so should we 

 find lots of eggs in these frames on the fourth day after inserting the ex- 

 cluder we know she is above it, but if there are no eggs then she must be 

 below. When she is above nothing needs to te done for 21 days. At the 

 end of that time all the young brood below the excluder will have hatched 

 out, so the old hive may be at once removed from the stand, also the ex- 

 cluder which has finished its work and is no longer needed. 



