156 



THE AMERICAN BEE-KEEPER. 



August, 



the front of the liive during a good 

 honey flow. 



NoAv, another thing in connection 

 with this is the manipulation of the 

 supers. Bee-keepers have largely 

 been instructed to place an empty su- 

 per between a partly-filled one and 

 the brood chamber, when wishing to 

 give more room, instead of putting it 

 on top of the one that is already on 

 the hive. It has been claimed for 

 this that the bees are spurred to 

 greater activity to fill in the empty 

 space thus made between their sur- 

 plus honey and brood combs than 

 could be achieved in any other way. 

 But careful observation leads me to 

 question the correctness of such ma- 

 nipulation. My experience has been 

 that the farther I could draw the 

 comb builders from the brood combs 

 by hive manipulation the better were 

 the results in honey secured. We all 

 know that young bees are prone to 

 cluster on cr to keep close to the 

 brood combs and this action seriously 

 obsti'ucts ventilation which in turn 

 provokes swarming. The empty super 

 next to the brood chamber might do 

 all I'ight where the hive sits in the 

 cool shade of a tree, but when it has 

 no further protection from the sun's 

 rays than an ordinary shade board, 

 I feel positively certain that better re- 

 sults will be obtained by putting it on 

 top. When suitable bait combs are 

 given, the young bees are soon im- 

 pelled to go above, thus effectiug a 

 general distribution of them through- 

 out the hive and preventing that un- 

 bearable jamming or clogging of the 

 passage-ways in the brood chambers. 



Grive your bees plenty of cool, fresh 

 air during the liot season. It is real 

 economy to do so and any hive that 

 does not afford good ventilation is not 

 practical and would be dear at any 

 price. 



Can Bees Rear Drone Brood from Eggs Laid in 

 Worker Cells. 



I am not going to say that they 

 can; neither am I going to say they 

 cannot; but I will say that I have 

 seen them do some things that looked 

 very much like they were able to rear 

 da'ones from fertile eggs laid in work- 

 er cells. 



During the latter part of June I 

 shook the bees of a good strong col- 

 ony into an empty brood chamber, 

 put on a queen excluding honey-board 

 and then gave them the same exti'act- 

 ing super that Avas on the old hive. 

 The combs in the super were all nice 

 straight worker comb and the queen 

 had free access to them, before the 

 change was made into the new hive. 

 About one week later I looked into 

 the hive and found what might be ex- 

 pected, that the bees had done prac- 

 tically nothing below but had carried 

 their pollen and honey into the super; 

 queen cells had been started and alto- 

 gether the colony had behaved about 

 like a queenless colony. There be- 

 ing no drone brood in the super and 

 the bees feeling the need of drones, 

 they had presumed to rear them from 

 larwae in the worker combs. The cells 

 were accordingly lengthened and from 

 the size of the larvae it was evident 

 that fertile workers were not respon- 

 sible for the state of affairs, for 

 there had not been time enough for 

 larvae to attain that size from eggs 

 laid by them. There was not just a 

 few scatten'ing cells that were thus 

 lengthened but puite a large amoiint 

 of comb was raised to accommodate 

 the apparently changed condition of 

 the larvae. I have witnessed the 

 same thing many times in queenless 

 colonies and in queenless nuclei. I 

 know that in changing from worker 

 to drone size of cells or vice versa, 

 when building comb, bees will often 

 construct cells which to the eye ap- 

 pear to be of worker size but in 

 reality are a little larger. But this 

 brood that was in the lengthened cells 

 was not sandwiched in between drone 

 and worker cells in the same comb, 

 but it was in comb that was uniform- 

 ly of the worker size of cell. Now 

 gentlemen, you may draw your own 

 conclusions, I pass it up. 



Wheelersburg, O.. July 11, 1904. 



The Rocky Mountain Bee Journal 

 and the Pacific States Bee Journal 

 have been consolidated iinder the 

 name of the Western Bee Journal, 

 with P. F. Adelsbaugh at the editorial 

 helm. The new journal is neat, spicy 

 and instructive. It deserves success. 



