AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



149 



it was by bees of the old colony, after a 

 sufficient absence for the bees in the old 

 hive to accept for themselves a young 

 queen, or cells, in which case the ab- 

 sence may sometimes not exceed five 

 minutes. 



A hiving arrangement that required 

 a hiye in front or beneath was too ex- 

 pensive at once, while Mr. Pratt's late 

 hiving-board admitted of making a Hed- 

 don hive-stand into a hive by having a 

 bottom put into it so the bees could re- 

 main in new quarters until the bee- 

 keeper came around to fix them up. 



In my case, I do not have any use for 

 hive-stands, and would prefer the en- 

 trance to be one or two auger holes in 

 the center of the front board of the 

 hive, the only possible objection being 

 that it would be harder for the bees to 

 carry out dirt and rubbish. But if this 

 difficulty does not confront the " K. D." 

 hive, it would not any hive. 



A hive composed of shallow sections 

 would admit of a hive-stand the same 

 depth of a section, so what work the 

 swarm did might be in the regular-sized 

 brood-frames. By this plan a part of 

 the former expense could be avoided. As 

 to whether such hiving apparatus should 

 be procured, depends as well upon the 

 amount of swarming we have. This 

 season, out of 150 colonies, I had two 

 swarms. Last season, in Colorado, I 

 think there were about six out of 300 

 colonies. In 1891, I had eight swarms 

 out of 100 colonies. In 1890, one out 

 of 40, and in 1889, one out of 100 

 colonies. 



In the earlier seasons of my bee-keep- 

 ing I used to have considerable swarm- 

 ing, and I think now it must have been 

 caused from the lack of understanding 

 as to when and how the surplus room 

 should be given. There are apiaries 

 here which have this season- cast one 

 swarm for every two colonies they con- 

 tained, but it was caused from the lack 

 of space to rear brood or store honey. If 

 we wait until the lower story is full of 

 brood, and a strip of capped honey is 

 along the top-bars before putting on the 

 upper stories, it may not have any effect 

 upon a colony swarming, because the 

 brood and honey-storage departments 

 may remain in a crowded condition be- 

 cause of the failure to properly occupy 

 the added space. When one or two of 

 the central combs begin to be capped, is 

 the time more space is needed, and it is 

 an excellent plan to put the one or two 

 capped combs into the upper story, and 

 put empty combs or frames in the center 

 of the brood-chamber in their places, so 

 that the bees will immediately occupy 



the added room. In short, after the 

 colony has once felt the need of more 

 spacious quarters, it is almost useless to 

 give more room with the exception that 

 it will prevent or retard swarming. 



I presume it was decided that self- 

 hivers had "had their day," on account 

 of the new swarming devices. If there 

 are so few swarms, will it pay to re- 

 adjust the hives and supers all the sea- 

 son to prevent them ? It looks like culti- 

 vating ten acres to kill the weeds that 

 were liable to grow on one^ and it would 

 seem to some the easier to wait until 

 the weeds came out of the ground on 

 the one acre and then pull them out by 

 hand. 



One bad feature of the self-hiver is 

 the loss of young queens when the bees 

 attempt to supersede the old queen. The 

 swarming devices havo this same fault, 

 as when the young queen comes out to 

 mate she would be conducted into the 

 wrong brood-chamber. This might su- 

 persede the old queen, but would end in 

 laying-workers in the other hive, and in 

 the end the laying-workers may get into 

 the other hive and result in laying- 

 workers in both colonies. 



In consequence of my experience of 

 several years with the queen-restrictor, 

 I know without trial that these devices 

 will do all that is claimed for them, but 

 no more than the queen-restrictor. 



About four years ago, in a foot-note 

 to an article in Gleanings, in which I 

 had explained that inversion of the re- 

 strictor would prevent the construction 

 of queen-cells, the editor said, " If we 

 are not mistaken, the inversion of 

 queen-cells does not always cause their 

 destruction ; how is this, friends ?" 



The point I wished to make was, if 

 the restrictor was reversed early enough, 

 and often enough, no queen-cells could 

 be built except by starting them wrong 

 side up. The negligent apiarist would 

 be very likely to omit the inversion until 

 it was too late — until the cells were 

 nearly completed. This same negligence 

 will cause swarming with any plan. 



My bees began to swarm this year on 

 March 25th, and there were about 40 

 swarms in the following 35 days. They 

 were headed for the honey harvest about 

 May 5th, after which date only two 

 swarms issued. The honey harvest be- 

 gan on May 18th to 20th, and ended 

 June 25tl\. The bees are still gathering 

 a little honey, but it appears to be im- 

 possible to make them swarm. My crop 

 is about 80 pounds of extracted honey 

 to the colony, or about one-third of what 

 it should have been. One-third is dark 

 and unsalable, and the best quality com- 



