190 



THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



colony with water, for twent^'-four 

 hours at least and it also has a ten- 

 dency to keep the bees cool and 

 quiet. 



I once received a colony of bees 

 from the west which were packed 

 splendidly. Above the combs was 

 a space of about three inches, and 

 water was supplied the bees by 

 rolling up some burlap and tho- 

 roughly saturating it with water. 

 This bundle of old bagging was 

 fastened in the space over the 

 combs. It was the best method 

 I ever saw for supplying water to 

 bees while being transported. 



MARKING HIVES. 



The beekeeper who has a large 

 apiary, or who is rearing a large 

 number of queens cannot stop to 

 make a written record of everything 

 going on in the apiary. Mr. Doo- 

 little has given his phin for keep- 

 ing a convenient record of eacli 

 colony of bees in his yard, but such 

 a method would not do for me. I 

 must have something more conve- 

 nient and easy to handle. Mr. D. 

 uses small stones placed on each 

 hi\e to indicate the condition of 

 each particular colony ; that is very 

 good, and I sometimes use stones 

 myself for certain marks. I carry in 

 my pocket some large flat-headed 

 tacks, or nails. Should the reader 

 visit my apiary he will notice that 

 each nucleus hive has one such nail 

 sticking in some part of the cover 

 of each hive but not all are placed 

 in the same position. When a nu- 

 cleus is known to be queenless the 

 nail is invariably placed in the 

 front edge of the cover of the hive. 

 A nail has been thus used in my 

 apiary for nearly twenty-seven 

 years. When the nail is placed 

 on W\Q front of the hive it indicates 

 that a queen-cell was recently put 

 in the hive. Now if a lot of cells 

 are introduced, say to-day, the nail 

 is placed in the centre of the front 

 of the hive. If another Jot of cells 



is given other hives the next day 

 the nail is placed at one side of 

 the center of the front, and so on. 

 The different positions of the nail 

 when placed in the cover of tlie hive 

 indicate the different lots of queens 

 or cells that have been introduced 

 from day to day. When I want a 

 lot of queens to ship I am not com- 

 pelled to open every hive in the 

 yard to find those laying. I keep 

 the run of all the queens that are 

 likely to be laying by the position 

 of the nail. For instance, vvlien 

 the nail is sticking in the centre of 

 the cover I know that that queen 

 has been in the hive long enough 

 to become fertile. I open the hive 

 and find that the queen is laying. 

 Well, now if those hives that have 

 the nail in the centre of the cover 

 are opened, twenty-four out of 

 twenty-five queens will usually be 

 found laying. The advantage of 

 the nail sj'stem will readily be 

 seen by anyone, as it saves much 

 time and labor, when one has 300 

 nucleus hives in his apiary to at- 

 tend to. Some one will say, "won- 

 der how one can know what hives 

 contain tested queens or a very fine 

 queen?" Well 'tis easy enough. 

 When a hive contains a very choice 

 queen two nails are placed side 

 by side in the cover of that hive or 

 three nails as the case may be. It 

 is no trouble to keep a lot of nails 

 in one's vest pocket for use at any 

 and all times. One nail is gener- 

 ally all that is needed for a hive 

 during the season. 



QUEEN-REARING. 



Although we had a set-back 

 early in the season by the cells not 

 hatching, we are now doing well, 

 and can forward queens by return 

 mail. 



This spring we have purchased 

 several quite large lots of bees of 

 various strains. Some pure hlacTx, 

 hybrids and some fine and very 

 pure colonies of Italian bees. The 



