274 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



May 5, 



reaches from 60- to 75^ during the middle of the day. With 

 a temperature of less than 60- above zero, brood is liable to 

 be more or less injured in handling, from which a positive loss 

 is made rather than the intended gain. If the weather is fine 

 about this time, the internal condition of each colony is in- 

 spected by taking the frames out of the hives, cleaning the 

 dead bees off the bottom-boards should any remain in the bot- 

 tom corners of the hives, seeing that each colony has a queen, 

 and that there is honey enough to last at least two weeks. 



A good queen is of no more importance at this time than 

 is this two or three weeks of honey, which now means from 

 six to ten pounds, for if the bees do not have enough stores so 

 they need not feel it necessary to economize, a good queen and 

 all else will not make up the lack, for bees will not rear much 

 brood if they are obliged to economize for fear of starvation 

 in the immediate future. 



After seeing that all have a good queen and sulficlent 

 stores they are now left till willow and hard maple bloom, 

 when, if the weather Is favorable, the combs in the brood-nest 

 are reverst by putting those frames having the least brood in 

 them in the center of the cluster, and those having the most 

 at the outside, thus causing the queen to fill these center 

 combs with eggs as fully as were those which were in the cen- 

 ter before, or more so, while the brood in those now on the 

 outside is not allowed to decrease at all. In this way a great 

 gain is made, as I have proven by leaving rows of hives in the 

 apiary untoueht, and by treating others as here given. Un- 

 derstand X am speaking of the frames whichhave brood in 

 them, or what is termed the " brood-nest," and not the brood- 

 chamber. Only the frames having brood in them are reverst 

 — the rest are left uutoucht. 



In about two weeks the brood-nest is reverst again, at 

 which time all but the very weakest colonies will have brood 

 in all, or all but one or two combs, after which there is no 

 gain made in handling the frames, unless you have some spe- 

 cial object in view, such as taking away the queen, changing 

 brood from the stronger to the weaker colonies, or something 

 of that sort. In two or three days after the last reversing is 

 done the colonies are ready for the sections, if there is any 

 honey coming In from the fields. If not, it is better to wait 

 till the hives become a little more populous; yet, if we wait 

 too long the colony Is apt to contract the swarming fever be- 

 fore they go to work in the sections, In which case our pros- 

 pect for a large yield of honey is lessened. 



As a rule, the fewer swarms that issue the greater the 

 yield of honey ; yet where bees get the swarming fever, as 

 they often will in spite of all precautions, better results will 

 then be obtained to let them have their own way, using the 

 Heddon plan of preventing after-swarms, or some other 

 equally good plan, than to try to keep these "fractious" bees 

 all In the old hive. Onondaga Co., N. Y. 



Do Bees Steal Eggs as Well as Honey? 



BY "COMMON-SENSE BEE-KEEPING." 



Yes, they do, if they are prest'by necessity, and 1 know it, 

 and this is how I proved it : 



I had a few hives built so that after the swarm should 

 issue I could make nuclei of the old hive without taking the 

 parts away from the old stand, so that notwithstanding the 

 separation the brood-nest would remain just as compact as 

 before to retain the heat of the whole body for a greater pro- 

 tection against the fluctuations of temperature between cold 

 nights and hot days. The entrances and approaches thereto 

 were also duly separated so that the several nuclei could use 

 the same alighting-board. At first the approaches were not 

 divldei.' by sufficient means to prevent the bees from seeing 

 each other In coming aud going. And when it was time for 

 the young queens to begin to lay, I opened up their domiciles 

 for examination. 



The first queen to the right had begun laying nicely, hav- 

 ing quite a stock of larvte and eggs, but the "nucleus next to 

 her showed no signs of a queen, tho her empty cell was there 

 from which she had emerged, and all the brood was hatcht 

 except a few scattering cells. I suspected at once that the 

 young queen had mist her way on returning home after mat- 

 ing, and on entering the wrong place had been dualized by 

 her sister. But I said possibly she hatcht late, and I can't 

 find her among the bees, so I will give her a week or 10 days 

 to show up signs of business. 



When I opened them again the colony was weaker, as a 

 matter of course, with less honey and nearly all of their combs 

 empty. But as strange as it may seem, there on one comb 

 hung five beautiful queen-cells all sealed over, besides about 



40 worker-cells capt over, where there were empty cells at my 

 last call. 



Now if they had had a fresh young queen she would not 

 have suspended work on the first hour of her fertility, which 

 the condition of things would indicate if they hadn't borrowed 

 the eggs. Again, if they had had a fertile young queen in 

 their weak condition, they would have taken the first eggs she 

 laid to build queen-cells with and fix for swarming. 



The only solution I could reach that seemed reasonable 

 was, that they had gone around the partition to the next 

 nucleus on either hand, and had helpt themselves to eggs for, 

 a starting In their misfortune of being queenless. 



If any one has a more reasonable solution I should be glad 

 to hear it. 



But the sublimesl thing that I see in this whole case is 

 the proof that bees have power to reason fully up to the neces- 

 sities of their case. So they are not altogether creatures of 

 instinct. See ? Pennsylvania. 



How to Prevent After-Swarniing. 



BY C. P. DADANT. 



I have received the following letter, which I will answer 

 in the American Bee Journal : 



I would like a little advice about keeping my bees from swarm- 

 ing after the first swarm leaves the hive. In our location they 

 swarm too much. C.4RL AxoREE. 



Cuyahoga Co., Ohio. 



It is very difficult, it not impossible, to keep the bees 

 from swarming when they are in small hives and crowded for 

 room for the queen to lay. But there are methods by which 

 the tendency to swarm may be increast, and others by which 

 it is alleviated to a great extent. Any Impediment to the free 

 access to all parts of the hives, not only for the passage of the 

 bees, but for a free circulation of air, will tend to make them 

 uncomfortable and cause them to get the swarming impulse. 

 The fact that when they get this desire to swarm it Is almost 

 Impossible to change it is clearly shown by the appellation of 

 this condition by old apiarists as " the swarming fever." 



Separators, drone-traps, queen-excluders, and the thou- 

 sand and one contrivances that have been praised from time 

 to time by enthusiasts, but which hinder or confine the bees, 

 are sure to help enhance the swarming fever. A much-divided 

 super cut up into small sections has a tendency In that direc- 

 tion. It is for this reason that we have always been In favor, 

 with Oliver Foster and other noted producers, of sections that 

 were open so as to allow the bees to pass freely from one to 

 another. The section open three ways has proven a step in 

 the right direction ; as it can either be used as closed or open 

 top, and permits of the passage of the bee from one to 

 another. With closed sections the bees have to descend to 

 the lower apartment, or rather to the space above it in order 

 to pass from one super to another. lean only compare this to 

 a house in which the up-stairs rooms would have no door of 

 communication with each other, but would have each a stair- 

 way communicating with the lower apartment — a rather sorry 

 arrangement. Indeed. 



Your question is in regard to preventing all swarms after 

 the first swarm. There is only one method that I know of to 

 accomplish this result, and it is not of my own invention, but 

 I read it years ago In the work of Hamet, a French writer on 

 bees of " box-hive " fame, and this method has proven quite 

 successful. I gave it in one of the bee-papers several years 

 ago, and a number of apiarists reported favorably upon It, 

 after having given It a thorough trial. It consists In hiving 

 the swarm and returning it to the parent hive about 48 hours 

 after swarming. As the reader will see, it does not prevent 

 swarming, but simply does away with the swarm and the in- 

 convenience of having too great a number of weakened colo- 

 nies, and the result is the same (excepting the labor involved) 

 as If the colony had not swarmed. 



This method has been tried on the first swarm. On this 

 it is not very successful, for It leaves the hives with the same 

 strength as it originally possest, and otherwise unchanged 

 conditions. But when practiced on the second, or succeeding 

 swarms, it has full effect In most instances. 



The effect of this measure Is easily reasoned out. When 

 the colony has cast a large swarm, as the first usually is, the 

 followingissues are only a result of the feverish or excited 

 condition of the bees, and of the fact that a number of young 

 queens are hatcht, or about to. The second, if large, usually 

 leaves the hive in a depopulated condition, and the fever abates 

 at once. The remaining bees either destroy, or allow to be 

 destroyed, by personal combat all the young queens that might 

 cause another issue. If the swarm is returned in about 4S 



