i'HE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



485 



opened hives during such battles and 

 found the queen " balled," era queen- 

 cell started, or both.— G. L. Tinker. 



Natural Swarms or Nuclei— WMcli? 



iliiery, IMo. 288.— Does it pay to let bees 

 swarm ? Or is it best to form nuclei ? Or 

 does it pay to let them hang on the hive 5 or 

 8 days, waiting for them to swarm, and very 

 likely they do not swarm at all, as I have 

 had them to do this before, and those colo- 

 nies were the very ones that had to be fed 

 in the winter ?— W. A., Mo. 



]. No. 2. Yes. 3. No.— Dadant 



&SON. 



1. Yes. 2. Yes. 3. Give room so 

 they can work instead of hanging out. 



— G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



1. There are many opinions in re- 

 gard to this matter, and each must 

 decide for himself. 2. I most cer- 

 tainly should divide ordinarily. If, 

 however, no honey was being gath- 

 ered from the fields, the bees would 

 be very excusable for not working, 

 there being nothing for them to do.— 

 J. E. Pond, Jr. 



It will pay to let bees swarm if you 

 vpant increase. If bees are managed 

 rightly, and given room at the right 

 time, and in the right way, they will 

 not hang out in idleness if there is 

 nectar in the flowers. Sometimes a 

 colony will seem to waste time in an 

 unaccountable way, but they are ex- 

 ceptions to the general rule ; under 

 proper management, dividing such 

 colonies will break the spell.— G. W. 

 Demaree. 



If increase is desired it may pay to let 

 them swarm, but even for this object 

 it would be still better to divide. If 

 I were working the bees for honey, I 

 should not want over one swarm from 

 a colony, and if there was no demand 

 for bees, I should not allow any in- 

 crease. My experience is, that strong 

 colonies that do not swarm, if in a 

 normal condition, and with a fair sea- 

 son, will always gather enough to 

 winter on. If they fail to do this, 

 then the fault belongs to the season 

 and not to the bees.— J. P. H. Brown. 



It pays usually to let them swarm. 

 If bees '' hang out" five or eight days 

 during a flow of honey, when they 

 have room for storing it, are shaded, 

 and have suflScient entrance to the 

 hive, etc., 1 should say it was a very 

 poor strain of bees, and should change 

 the queens at once. There is much 

 "food for thought" in the above 

 query.— W. Z. Hutchinson. 



If they are ready to swarm, and 

 you find it convenient, then let them 

 swarm. If it is more to your con- 

 venience form nuclei and build up. I 

 have to do this, and find it works 

 well. If the bees do not swarm as I 

 wish them to do, I make them con- 

 tribute to build up nuclei. Did not 

 poor management keep them idle V— 

 A. J. Cook. 



Whether it pays to make increase 

 by dividing colonies, or to encourage 

 or discourage natural swarming, de- 



pends upon circumstances that I 

 know not of in your case. At no time 

 should your bees be idle, " hanging 

 on the hives," increase or no increase, 

 if there is nectar to be gathered. — 

 James Heddon. 



1. Yes, in some cases. 2. In some 

 cases, yes. 3. It does not pay to let 

 them hang on the hive waiting. What 

 are you doing all this time V I do not 

 keep that kind of a queen long. — H. 

 D. Cutting. 



Let the bees swarm if they cannot 

 be prevented by giving them surplus 

 room early, and as often as they need 

 it. There will be no loss of honey in 

 the operation, if properly managed, 

 and only a little more work for the 

 apiarist. If the bees layout, refusing 

 to work in the sections when honey 

 is coming in, I would place in the 

 super a partly-filled section from 

 another colony, and get comb-build- 

 ing started. If the bees that hang 

 out are found full of honey, they are 

 not idlers though they do not swarm 

 at all. They are secreting wax if 

 comb-building is going on inside of 

 the hive.— G L. Tinker. 



OUR CLUBBING LIST. 



We supply the American Bee Jonrnal 



one year, and any of the following publica- 

 tions, at the prices quoted In the last column 

 of figures. The first column gives the regu- 

 lar price of both. All postage prepaid. 



Price of both. Club 

 The American Bee Journal 1 00 . . 



and Gleanings in Bee-Culture 2 00.. 1 75 



Bee-Keepers'Magazine 2 00.. 175 



Bee-Keepers' Guide 150.. 140 



The Apioulturist 2 00.. 1 75 



Canadian Bee Journal 2 00 . . 1 75 



Texas Bee Journal 2 00.. 175 



The 7 above-named papers 6 50.. 5 50 



and Cook's Manual 2 25. . 2 00 



Bees and Honey (Newman). . .2 00. . 1 75 

 Binder for Am. Bee Journal. .1 75.. 1 60 

 Dzierzon's Bee-Book (cloth) ... .3 00 . . 2 00 

 Root's A B Cof Bee-Culture.. 2 25.. 2 10 



Farmer's Account Book 4 00.. 3 00 



Guide and Hand-Book 150.. 130 



Heddon's book, "Success,".. 150 1 40 



Home Market for Honey- 



tS~ To create Honey Markets in every 

 village, town and city, wide-awake honey 

 producers should get the Leaflets " Why Eat 

 Honey" (only oQ cents per 100), or else the 

 pamphlets on "Honey as Food and Medicine," 

 and scatter them plentifully, and the result 

 will be a demand for all of their crops at 

 remunerative prices. " Honey as Food and 

 Medicine " are sold at the following prices : 



Single copy, 5 cts. : per doz., 40 cts. ; per 

 hundred, $2.50. Five hundred will be sent 

 postpaid for $10.00; or 1,000 for $15,00. 

 On orders of 100 or more, we will print, if 

 desired, on the cover-page, "Presented by," 

 etc. (giving the name and address of the bee- 

 keeper who scatters them). 



To give a»vay a copy of " Honey as Food 

 and Medicine " to every one who buys a 

 package of honey, will sell almost any quan- 

 tity of it. 



To any One sending us one new sub- 

 scriber with their own renewal (with $2.00), 

 we will present a copy of the new " Con- 

 vention History of America." 



Explanatory.— The figures before the 

 names indicate the number of years that the 

 person has kept bees. Those aftf.h, show 

 the number of colonies the writer had in the 

 previous spring and fall, or fall and spring, 

 as the time of the year may require. 



This mark © indicates that the apiarist is 

 located near the center of the State named; 

 5 north of the center; ? south; 0+ east; 

 K3 west; and this 6 northeast; X) northwest: 

 o- southeast; and ? southwest of the center 

 of the State mentioned. 



For the American Bee Joumnl. 



Capg M IntroiciuE Oueen-Cells, 



G. M. DOOLITTLE. 



Years ago it was ascertained that if 

 a colony of bees had been queenless 

 from 24 to 48 hours, a queen -cell of 

 any stage of advancement might be 

 given this colony, and the colony 

 accept the queen hatching therefrom 

 the same as it would one hatched 

 from its own brood. Advantage was 

 taken of this to change inferior stock 

 to such stock as was desired, and 

 what has been known as the "cell 

 plan," has been more largely used for 

 the improvement of stock during the 

 past century than any other. 



When the queen traflic sprang up, 

 so that the bee-keepers reared queens 

 and sold them the same as other 

 stock was sold, it became an object to 

 place a nearly mature queen-cell in a 

 colony or nucleus, at the same time 

 the queen to be sent off was taken 

 away. Upon trial it was found that 

 the bees did not propose at all times 

 to accept of such an exchange, and 

 especially before they had realized 

 that their laying queen had been 

 taken away from them. Their non- 

 acceptance of cells given in this way 

 proved with me to be a rule, although 

 a few have reported favorably. In 

 fact, unless I waited from 36 to 48 

 hours after the removal of a laying 

 queen, before giving a cell, 19 out of 

 every 20 would be destroyed ; while 

 other apiarists have reported nearly 

 the same result. As waiting two 

 days every time a queen was sold 

 from a nucleus before a cell was given, 

 and then from one to two more before 

 it hatched, was quite expensive, I 

 tried many plans to obviate the diflS- 

 cult.y, none of which gave me satis- 

 faction. 



One night, after thinking the mat- 

 ter over, I fell asleep. After sleeping 

 an hour or two I sucldenly awoke with 

 the vision of a cage for caging queen- 

 cells appearing before me. Now the 

 idea of caging queen-cells is old, and 

 cages specially adapted for this pur- 

 pose have been advertised for a good 

 many years, but the ideal cage pre- 

 sented before me at this time was for 

 the special purpose of allowing the 

 safe introduction of a queen-cell 

 nearly mature, to a colony at the time 



