Februai)-, igog. 



American Hee Journal 



wide spacing, but we here in America 

 have lots of time after the close of 

 the season for the bees to finish up the 

 curing and capping of their honey, be- 

 fore it is necessary to extract. 



No difference is noticed whether 8, 

 9 or 10 frames are used in the lo-frame 

 story, as to swarming, the bees enter- 

 ing the stories readily. 



In conclusion I would say that if the 

 frame the extracting comb is built in 

 is J^-inch wide, no trouble will be ex- 

 perienced in uncapping the comb in one 

 full sheet; or, in other words, if frames 

 are spaced ij^ inches from center to 

 center, the combs will be bulged enough 

 so there will be no trouble in cutting 

 off the entire capping from one side of 

 the comb at one stroke of the knife. 

 Ten combs in this space are too lean 

 to uncap to a good advantage, even with 

 J^-inch wide frames. With a frame 

 % wide for our extracting combs, 

 either lyi or Ij4 spacing can be used 

 to good advantage ; with i i-i6-inch 

 wide top-bar extracting frame, i^-inch 

 spacing is closest that will uncap to 

 good advantage. 



Remus, Mich. 



Pollen Starvation Cause of 

 Foul Brood 



BY W. H. MESSENGER. 



The June American Bee-Keeper says : 

 "Gleanings has repeatedly declined to 

 give space to Mr. Huxley's new ideas, 

 apparently because they are so radically 

 at variance with accepted teachings." 

 In the same issue is this : "Dr. White of 

 the United States Bureau of Entomol- 

 ogy, Washington, for the same reason, 

 declines to conduct experiments along 

 lines suggested by Mr. Huxley, although 

 he admits that the latter's theories may 

 be correct, and that if they may be 

 proven so it will be quite an advance 

 in scientific research." 



Mr. Huxley's letter is on the origin 

 of foul brood, and puts it down to in- 

 sufficient pollen (pollen starvation) from 

 the third or fourth day of the larva. 

 Not such a terrible dogma surely for 

 people to fight shy of, who earnestly 

 wish to get the mastery of foul brood. 



Now I have all the text-books pub- 

 lished in this country, subscribe for all 

 its journals, and send to Washington 

 for every bulletin published to do with 

 bees and kindred subjects, and I learn 

 the same from all. They teach you 

 how to distinguish it when you get it, 

 and also how to cure it. (And by the 

 way, a person that has learned by the 

 study of chemistry or photography what 

 a clean vessel is, and how to obtain it, 

 will stand more show of making a thor- 

 ough cure without destroying property 

 than one who has not learned what 

 "clean" means to a chemist.) When it 

 comes to the question of how you got 

 foul brood, in the first place, they one 

 and all look for some outside source of 

 contamination — by introducing queens in 

 the original mailing-cages, by feeding 

 bought honey, or by robber-bees. Never 

 have I read, outside of Mr. Huxley's 

 letter, that it can be manufactured, as 

 it were, right in the apiary. I have 

 been of that opinion myself for a year, 



but not being a scientist I could not 

 write on the subject. Besides, I have no 

 knowledge except from the aforesaid 

 literature, and my own observations in 

 my ozim hives while building up a 

 i-frame nucleus to 20 colonies in 3 

 years. Those observations have con- 

 vinced me that if I am not careful I 

 will have foul brood, and it will have 

 originated right in my own apiary. The 

 facts are these : 



In the fall of 1906 I went into winter 

 quarters with 3 weakish colonies. In the 

 spring of 1907 I found one with a 

 drone-laying queen. The old queen had 

 been superseded late, as I clip, and she 

 was not clipped. I sent for a queen 

 and took all the frames with drone- 

 brood away. Later I used those frames, 

 putting them in with dead capped drones 

 in worker-cells, though several weeks 

 after. These combs were used in the 

 3 original colonies, the increase building 

 new combs and several times through 

 the year there were scattering cells of 

 dead brood in those 3 colonies, the brood 

 turning yellow before dragged out. 



They went into winter quarters rea- 

 sonably strong (outdoor wintering in 

 double-walled, cork-packed hives), and 

 from each of those 3 colonies I would 

 scrape out weekly about a half cupful 

 of dead bees, wnile from the other 6 

 about a score. The past spring they 

 were terribly weak, dead brood scattered 

 all over, and some yellow, some jet 

 black, and some dried down to a scale 

 at the bottom of the cell, and some 

 perforated cappings. Everything ac- 

 cording to illustrations and description — 

 foul brood — except that there was no 

 odor (and I certainly know the smell 

 of glue), and not the slightest ropiness 

 in any I tried, and I tried hundreds. 

 I changed them with very strong colo- 

 nies, and as I number the same as Dr. 

 Miller, I charged back in 3 weeks. 

 There was great improvement, but not 

 perfect, so I requeened. But there has 

 been more or less trouble right along 

 until the fall flow set in, which is 

 practically the only flow here for sur- 

 plus. I have all frames marked where 

 any brood has died, for further observ- 

 ations ne.xt year. 



My opinion is that let brood die in a 

 weak colony from any cause, whether 

 pollen-starved or otherwise starved, 

 chilled, or any other way, and that brood 

 stays in the cells till rotten, subsequent 

 brood is likely to be contaminated, and 

 with continued neglect, bad weather, etc., 

 will eventually turn into mild and then 

 virulent foul brood. Of course, being 

 only a novice, I am not entitled to 

 propound a theory, and my opinion is 

 not worth much, but if correct and we 

 all knew it, how easy it would be to 

 keep our apiaries clean. I for one in 

 the future will cut comb containing 

 patches of dead brood before I give the 

 frame to the bees. 



The reason for this letter at this time 

 is that the National Convention will dis- 

 cuss this side of the foul brood ques- 

 tion. It is a sure thing that we have 

 to know more about it than we know at 

 present. We seem to be about at the 

 end of the beaten track, so we must try 

 a new path, and if after all the fan- 

 fare of trumpets this coming convention 

 has had, nothing more is dished up than 



a paper after the style of the one lately 

 read by F. R. Davenport at a meeting 

 of the Texas Bee-Keepers' Association, 

 I think Dr. Bohrer in the September 

 American Bee Journal hits the nail on 

 the head exactly. 



Port Richmond, N. Y. 



Introducing Queens — Classi- 

 fication of Queens 



BY EDWIN BEVINS. 



I have been killing old queens and in- 

 troducing young ones for quite a while, 

 and am not done yet (September 19). 

 I have bought all queens but one from 

 queen-breeders here and there. I had 

 one swarm this season, September 3 — the 

 only swarm from lOO colonies. I ex- 

 pected to get some queen-cells to give to 

 other colonies, but before I got them 

 ready some young queen in the swarm- 

 ing colony got around and stung all cells 

 but one. I put the frame with this in 

 a queenless colony, and have one new 

 queen reared in the yard. By the way. 

 I have a sort of liking for young queens 

 reared in the yard. The bees of some 

 reared in the yard last season have beat- 

 en everything in the yard this season. I 

 bought and introduced quite a number 

 of queens a year ago. Some have prov- 

 ed to be good, some bad, and some half- 

 way between. I have just killed 3 out 

 of 4 purchased of one man last fall. A 

 select untested queen from Ohio, cost- 

 ing me $1.25, has proven nearly worth- 

 less for comb honey production, or per- 

 haps it would be better to say her bees 

 have so proven. I will try her next, sea- 

 son for extracted honey. 



It has been my practice ever since I 

 began to be interested in bees (some 15 

 years ago) to buv of queen-breeders a 

 few queens every year. I have bought 

 some from the most noted breeders and 

 many from breeders of less repute. 

 With very few exceptions the queens 

 have been what I might reasonably ex- 

 pect for the money paid. There is in the 

 yard the blood of queens from nearly 

 half of the States of the Union, and be 

 it a consequence or not, my bees are 

 hustlers when there is anything to hustle 

 for. 



I am trying this season to introduce 

 queens by the Abbott plan. I receive a 

 queen by mail, then I put an empty 

 comb-honey super or a rim about 2 in- 

 ches on the hive, and lay the cage, wire- 

 cloth down, on top of the brood-frames 

 without removing the cork. Leave it 

 so for about 24 hours. Then prepare an 

 empty hive with excluder-zinc before the 

 entrance, then set the hive with doomed 

 queen off its stand and put an empty 

 hive in its place. Then I shake the bees 

 from the combs in front of the empty 

 hive, and put the combs in the hive in 

 the same order as found in the old hive. 

 This way of finding queens is a necessity 

 with me, as my eyesight is now so poor 

 that it is nearly impossible to distinguish 

 the queen from any other bee. Even 

 with this method, if the sun is not shin- 

 ing brightly on the front of the hive, I 

 have to get some other person to find 

 and kill the queen. Some readers may 

 say or think I had better get out of the 



