928 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Nov. 1 



not know. I have had one queen, to my 

 own personal knowledg-e, take her wedding- 

 flig-ht when three daj's old from the time of 

 hatching-. I once conducted a series of 

 observations to find when the first evi- 

 dences of fertilization appear after hatch- 

 ing. It was from three to seven days. 



The point that you do not quite under- 

 stand is this : That two or three virgins 

 may be caged in a hive at once. One will 

 be released, we will say, in a day. It may 

 take four or five days before she is ready 

 to take her flight. In the mean time, all 

 other caged virgins in the hive have reach- 

 ed the age of maturity. Queen No. 1 takes 

 her flight, we will say, in five days. In 

 three days she is laying, making eight 

 days from the time of hatching. Immedi- 

 ately on her laying, another virgin is caged, 

 when queen No. 2 of the first-cnged lot is 

 put in a condition to be released, which 

 will take, say, four or five hours. In 24 

 hours from the time the other queen was 

 taken out, queen No. 2 ma\' take her flight. 

 We will say she lays in three days. She 

 is then removed, and queen No. 3 takes her 

 place, and begins to lay, according to the 

 cycle we figure on, in four or five days 

 more. In the mean time, fresh virgins just 

 hatched are caged, and confined while they 

 are reaching the age of wedding flight. 

 During this time they are also acquiring 

 the scent of the bees, and so long as there 

 is no queen in the hive to object or inter- 

 fere, any one of them will be accepted by 

 the bees; and if she is of the proper age 

 she will begin taking her flight to meet the 

 drone. Now, I do not mean to give four or 

 five daj's as the absolute time from one laj'- 

 ing queen to another. It will var}' ; but 

 our experience is, on the average, two laying 

 queens to a nucleus in a week or ten daj's. 



On the single plan of introducing there 

 would be four or five days lost in getting a 

 just-hatched queen up to wedding- flight 

 age. If we add three days more for her to 

 lay in, there are eight days in all, taking 

 just twice the time I have allowed for the 

 dual plan of introducing. 



The whole secret of the plan rests in the 

 fact that the bees become acquainted, and 

 are' agreeable to three or four virgins at 

 once. They all smell alike; and if they are 

 released one at a time, so there can be no 

 mortal combat between any two of the 

 queens, all will go on lovely, and the cycle 

 of mating and laying will take place in 

 four or five days as against eight or ten 

 days the old way. But to keep up the 

 cycle a fresh virgin must be introduced or 

 caged at the time of taking out the laying 

 queen; so by the time No. 2 is ready to lay. 

 No. 3 will be ready to meet a drone. — Ed.] 



being simply not in it. We all know that, 

 with full sheets, we must have wired 

 frames; but for starters it is not absolutely 

 necessary. Mr. Doolittle says neither yes 

 nor no to the wiring of frames; but his sys- 

 tem of getting worker comb, page 426, ne- 

 cessitates cutting out the drone comb, and 

 he goes as far as to speak of patching. 

 Do you suppose this operation can be per- 

 formed without cutting the wires? 



Now with regard to full sheets on wired 

 frames, I have a mind to give you a photo 

 of a few to show that we do have failures 

 here; and others, I might sajs have had 

 the same trouble. But right here I will 

 say, hurrah for the Weed-process founda- 

 tion! for with it our failures are reduced 

 to a minimum. Geo. W. Strangways. 



Elora, Ont., Aug, 26. 



[I am of the opinion that Mr. Doolittle 

 does not wire; and even if he did, he could 

 easily insert patches of worker comb right 

 on to a wire by cutting a shallow slit in 

 the comb inserted. I would rather patch a 

 wired comb than one unwired. — Ed.] 



FEW COLONIES WINTERING WELL IN A CEL- 

 LAR. 



On page 230, in quotations, Ira Barber 

 says a few colonies will winter fairly well 

 in almost any cellar. Now, could four or 

 six colonies be wintered in a tight dry- 

 goods box in a medium dry cellar used for 

 storing apples and potatoes, temperature 

 sometimes going down to 30? It has a 

 flue which could be heated by artificial 

 heat if necessary. 



If advisable to try, how much ventilation 

 should the box have? and how ventilated? 

 Would not the temperature be considerably 

 higher in the box than in the cellar? 



G. M. Ellenberger. 



Belknap, Pa., Sept. 22. 



[I would not put the bees into the box re- 

 ferred to. Better put them into the cellar, 

 but darken it; and when you desire to get 

 vegetables, use a lamp. 



Ira Barber is right. — Ed.] 



WIRED FRAMES AND STARTERS; WEED NEW- 

 PROCESS FOUNDATION. 



I see in Stray Straws, page 707, that 

 Dr. Miller takes a peg at me again; but 

 really you know our discussion was on full 

 sheets versus starters, the wiring of frames 



EXTRACTING HONEY FROM UNFINISHED 



SECTIONS; CAN IT BE DONE WITHOUT 



BREAKING THE COMBS? 



Can honey in unfinished sections be 

 thrown out with extractor without breaking 

 out the comb? Lack of basswood honey 

 this season left me with a lot of unfinished 

 sections. As I have never used an ex- 

 tractor I ask for information. 



Passumpsic, Vt., Sept. 8. C. R. King. 



[Yes, it can be done very easily in the 

 case of most sections that are fastened on 

 three sides. Combs having only one or two 

 attachments would have to be handled very 

 carefully, of course, the speed of the ex- 

 tractor being reduced to where it would 

 just throw the honey and not break the 

 fastenings. — Ed. ] 



