April, 1909. 



Amarican ISee Journal 



left hand palm up, holding by that 

 strip-handle nailed at its centre, with the 

 right hand drop the frame over the 

 the board, and put the thumb of the 

 left hand against the bottom-bar, reach- 

 ing the thumb up so its pressure comes 

 on the uppermost edge of the bottom- 

 bar: held in this way the bottom-bar is 

 held firm and snug to the edge of the 

 guage-board, and the top-bar is held 

 down snug against the 2 short-stop nails, 

 and with a ^s-space crack the entire 

 length between it and the board. With 

 the" right hand lay the starter on the 

 board, and against the top-bar, inclining 

 the board from you, and also inclining 

 from your left to right, then with a 

 common tin teaspoon pour wax, starting 

 at the high end and let it run along the 

 bar and the starter until it reaches the 

 other end, when you bring the board to 

 a level so far as its length is concerned. 

 However, to keep the wax from passing 

 down between the starter and wasting 

 instead of running lengthwise, you must 

 incline the board so that the top-bar is 

 almost level crosswise. It takes only a 

 little bit of practice — just a few trials — 

 until you learn the angles at which to 

 hold the frame. If you get the wax 

 too hot it will melt the starter, and is 

 much more inclined to spread and 

 waste: if too cold, it congeals too quick- 

 ly and does not run freely. 



As fast as you get the wax run on, 

 pick off the frame and put it on a pile 

 beside you. until you have quite a bunch 

 of thein when you lay down the guage- 

 board and pick up the frame and run 

 a line of wax on the other side of the 

 starter, until you have cleaned up the 

 pile, when you run another batch the 

 first side on the guage-board to be 

 served in like manner. This puts a line 

 of wax on each side of the starter, and 

 it is there to stay. It is quicker done 

 than to put foundation into the groove 

 and put the wedge in, and while the 

 wedges will shrink and drop out this 

 will stay. And if you ever want to cut 

 out the comb and put a new starter in, 

 you have a good, smoothe surface to 

 work on. It does not take any more 

 wax, either, at least but a trifle more, 

 and any dirty or off-grade wax will do 

 the job. 



Colorado and all of us dry-climate 

 bee-keepers "have a kick coming" on 

 the frame with groove and wedge, for 

 unless we use the frame at once after 

 putting the starter in. or nail the wedge 

 fast, they drop out, then we have comb 

 built in all kinds of shapes, mixed with 

 wedges down on the bottom-bars_ until 

 it is like tearing a hive to pieces to get 

 thu frames out. Let me repeat, that the 

 method here outlined is easier, quicker, 

 cheaper and better, than the wedge 

 method. Try it. 



Loveland. Colo. 



(To be continued.) 



Superseding Queens— Uniting 

 Colonies— Shallow Feeders 



BY EDWIN EEVINS. 



Considerable has been said recently in 

 the bee-papers as to whether the bee- 

 keeper had better do some superseding 

 of queens himself, or leave the matter 

 entirely to the bees. My own experience 



convinces me that it would have been 

 better for me if I had taken a large hand 

 in the business every year since I came 

 to have any considerable number of 

 colonies. Last season, just after the 

 white clover harvest was over, I con- 

 cluded to requeen quite a number of 

 colonies that bad not stored any surplus, 

 by the plan used by Mr. Chapman in 

 requeening his old apiary. 



The writings of Dr. Miller had con- 

 vinced me that bees are not so foolish 

 as to use larvse too old for develop- 

 ment into good queens when they have 

 larvje of all ages to choose from. ^ I 

 made queenless some 12 to 15 colonies, 

 allowing the bees to requeen from their 

 own brood, except in one instance where 

 the brood was so scant that a frame of 

 brood was given from another colony. 



My examinations showed that but 4 

 colonies had made any attempt to super- 

 sede their queens. Three of them made 

 a success of it. In one colony I found 

 one sealed queen-cell, and as no other 

 cells had been started I concluded that 

 it was a case of supersedure, and did 

 not look any further for the queen. 

 Later I saw evidences of the work of 

 laying workers, and, on examining that 

 sealed cell. I found in it a dead queen. 



My experience seems to indicate that 

 but few of the colonies one desires re- 

 queened will requeen themselves at the 

 time the work ought to be done for the 

 advantage of the apiarist. Some will 

 not do it at all, as is proven by the fact 

 that I found 2 colonies fairly strong in 

 bees that were entirely without brood 

 of any age. I have seen but one criti- 

 cism of the above plan of requeening, 

 and that is that one perpetuates all the 

 bad qualities of some of the queens 

 superseded. This is not necessarily so, 

 as an exchange of brood is not difficult, 

 putting the brood of the undesirable 

 queen where it will not be used for 

 queen-rea'ring, and giving some from the 

 hive of a, better queen. 



In this case, it seems that it would be 

 a good plan to practise the method only 

 on colonies having satisfactory queens, 

 and to get satisfactory queens in the 

 other colonies as soon as possible. 



By a "satisfactory" queen I mean, of 

 course, a queen of a strain you are wil- 

 ling to perpetuate. 



UNITING COLONIES. 



I notice in Gleanings that Editor E. 

 R. Root has just made the discovery 

 that uniting bees by placing one or two 

 thicknesses of newspaper between the 

 two hives is a good thing. This is a 

 method I have long practised, and I de- 

 scribed it in the American Bee Journal 

 several years ago. Shortly after I men- 

 tioned the method in the American Bee 

 Journal. I noticed that Dr. Miller ad- 

 vised one of his questioners to unite in 

 the same way. I do not claim that the 

 method is original with me. Probably 

 I got the idea from some writer in some 

 one of the bee-papers. What I claim 

 is that the method is nothing new. 



SHALLOW FEEDERS FOR SUPERS. 



I wrote something quite a while ago 

 about the desirability of having some 

 shallow Hill feeders to use in spring 

 in chaff-packed comb-honey supers, on 

 top of the brood-frames. I found diffi- 

 culty in getting the shallow feeders, but 



the Dadants helped me out. They had 

 some of the perforated covers to the 

 quart feeders, and got their local tinner 

 to make feeders half the depth of the 

 quart ones to fit the covers. I used 

 some of these last spring in supers hav- 

 ing chaff cushions in them, and found 

 them to be very convenient, as the 

 cushions could be easily adjusted to 

 prevent the escape of heat from the 

 brood-chamber. The supers with their 

 chaf? cushions are left on all of my hives 

 till about the beginning of the honey- 

 flow, as I believe the temperature of 

 the hive is kept more uniformly warm 

 than it would be without them. 



Some claims used to be made for the 

 advantages of having single-walled hives, 

 and having them stand out in the sun- 

 shine all through the spring ; but I have 

 learned to be somewhat doubtful about 

 these advantages. The spring is not 

 all sunshine. I leave the winter pack- 

 ing of straw around three sides of my 

 hives till the middle of J\Iay, and some- 

 times later. 



Leon, Iowa. 



Laying Workers — How to 

 Get Rid of Them. 



BY G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



Before me lies a postal card which 

 reads as follows : 



"I had a colony last summer which had lay- 

 ing workers. I did everything — moved hive, 

 gave brood, etc., all to no purpose, the colony 

 Anally dying in early fall. What can I do to 

 save a colony under such circumstances in 

 the future? Would it do to unite them 

 with another colony? Would these worlcers 

 spoil that colony also? Please answer in the 

 American Bee Journal." 



Laying workers confront every bee- 

 keeper of any experience, sooner or la- 

 ter, especially if he does not keep a 

 good lookout to see that no colony goes 

 queenless more than 24 to 30 days, or 

 for 2 weeks or more after all brood has 

 emerged from the cells. If no queen is 

 provided, and especially if the bees are 

 of the Cyprian, Holy Land or Italian 

 races, the colony will, soon after all the 

 brood has emerged, set apart some of 

 the workers, from one to several hun- 

 dred, installing them as queens, after 

 which it is extremely difficult to cause 

 them to accept a queen of any kind. 



All colonies rearing young queens 

 should be looked after from 20 to 24 

 days after the issue of the prime swarm 

 or the taking away of the old queen, and 

 if eggs are not found the colony should 

 be given a frame of which many cells 

 contain eggs and small larv^, in which 

 case, if the young queen has become 

 lost from any cause, they can rear 

 another. This will keep the bees from 

 installing workers as queens, and at the 

 same time the building of queen-cells 

 on this brood is a sure indication of 

 queenlessness, and when cells are thus 

 built it is better, if possible, to introduce 

 a laying queen at once, for by the time 

 the Ijees can secure a laying queen from 

 this brood the colony will begin to be- 

 come populated, and by the time the 

 brood from her eggs emerges will be 

 nearly ruined from the loss of bees dy- 

 ing from old age. 



But, if the colony has a laying worker. 



