166 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Mar. U, 



some fine specimens growing at his home. Trim and cultivate 

 well the first year; the second year they will bloom, and from 

 that on the young lindens of your vicinity will be taken care 

 of as never before. The eagle eyes of your neighbors will 

 make the discovery that they have planted the wrong trees, 

 and will strive to their utmost to get In line by the shortest 

 route. 



The best trees are found in second growth woodland, 

 where the large timber has been removed about five years, 

 and can usually be obtained for the asking. The transplant- 

 ing may be done any time from fall until the leaves are out in 

 spring. As many roots as possible should be taken with the 

 tree, and all the limbs cut back to 10 inches, the ground well 

 tampt and pulverized around the tree when again in position, 

 with a good mulch on top for dry weather, and every tree will 

 grow nicely, and should be hoed once a week the first season. 



I will say in looking for the first-named trees, do not fail 

 to notice the little one and two year olds that you are tramp- 

 ing over, as they are also valuable. They are easily taken up, 

 and should be set in rows Zli feet wide and 8 inches apart, 

 and cultivate the same as corn. They are rapid growers, and 

 will surprise you the first year with their beauty, and, if a 

 fair season, they will be 5 and 6 feet high, and may be trans- 

 planted at any time. Trees grown in this manner are far 

 more vigorous, and will produce at least twice the amount of 

 bloom and honey of those reared in competition with other 

 timber. 



Our lives are short, yet in this we bequeath a noble ex- 

 ample, and the greatest part of the blessing to future genera- 

 tions, who will rejoice at each succeeding honey harvest for 

 untold ages to come, that they are blest with a supply of beau- 

 tiful linden honey, and no doubt often bless the names of the 

 fathers for thus perpetuating this greatest honey-tree. 



ZIoDSVille, Ind. 



No. 4 — Extracted Honey, and the Size of Hives. 



BY CHAS. DADANT. 



I think it will not be out of place here to say why I 

 prefer large to small hives, and consider them as better for 

 the production of extracted, or even of comb honey. 



One day, years ago, 1 went to the auction sale of a farmer 

 to buy a cow. This man had six colonies of bees in common 

 boxes; the movable-frame hives were but little known at that 

 time. The weather was cold, it was in March, and it was 

 impossible to judge of the strength of the colonies by the flight 

 of the bees. The hives were all small but one, which was 

 unusually large. I stooped behind the hives, tapping upon 

 them with my finger, and placing my ear against the box. 

 The answer of each of the small hives was, "F-ssss." The 

 answer of the large hive was "B-rrrrr." I was satisfied. 

 The small hives sold for $3.00 to $4.00 each. I bought the 

 large hive with bees for .$7.25, and it was a good bargain. 

 Bees were scarce aad honey was high, at that time. 



Very soon after, I transferred this colony to a 14-frame 

 American hive, and, to fill all these frames with worker-combs, 

 I had to add a few pieces taken from colonies that had died 

 during the winter, which I had purchased from neighbors. 

 The spring crop of this colony exceeded 160 pounds, not of 

 extracted, but of comb honey, which was sold at 2.5 cents per 

 pound. This first crop was sufficient to pay not only for the 

 colony itself, but also for the cow which I had bought at the 

 same sale. 



The crop of the other five colonies, purchased by another 

 man, amounted to nothing, comparatively. How do I explain 

 the difference in yield ? The queens of these small hives had 

 not, during the previous season, had sufficient room to lay ; 

 while, in the large hive, the queen had room enough to make 

 use of all her fecundity ; so, while the small hives maintained 

 but a small population the year round, the colony in the large 

 hive kept a stronger force, wintered better, had more honey 

 stored in its capacious quarters for spring breeding, and was 

 at all times ready for any emergency. 



This question of the prolificness of the queen has thus far 

 been much neglected by many bee-keepers. They want cheap 

 hives; but these small, cheap hives are comparatively dearer, 

 just like the five small-hive colonies of the above-mentioned 

 auction, which had cost their purchaser more than twice as 

 much as my large one, and yielded less honey all together than 

 my large-hive colony did. 



For a number of years, I have kept an observatory hive, 

 to watch the work of the bees, and I have often noticed 

 that a queen could lay 6 eggs in a minute. Other observers, 

 DzierzOM and Berlepsch, have noticed the same thing, and my 

 experience was but a repetition of theirs. Thus a queen can 

 lay 300 eggs in an hour, 3,600 in 10 hours. Of course a 



queen cannot, and does not, usually lay during more than 10 

 to 12 hours per day, in a good laying season, for she needs 

 rest. The laying of the queen is very much governed by the 

 workers, which give her more or less food, and by other 

 circumstances, such as the warmth and the bustle of the 

 colony. In winter, for instance, the bees are all quiet and eat 

 only what is indispensable to sustain life and warmth. The 

 heat is just sufficient to keep them alive, and the queen does 

 not lay at all. But as soon as the sun warms the air, the bees 

 fly out, coming home with more appetite. After filling their 

 stomach, if they meet the queen, they offer her food ; for this 

 seems to be a natural custom among the bees, a token of their 

 appreciation of the value of their mother. She accepts the 

 food and soon begins to lay. The more honey is carried about, 

 the more food is offered to her, the greater the bustle, the 

 greater the laying, and she lays according to the number of 

 bees living in the hive; since a large number of bees keep a 

 larger surface warm, and the queen will not lay, and eggs 

 will not hatch, in an area that is not kept warm by them. It 

 is thus evident that a large population thrives better and 

 causes an earlier and stronger spring breeding. 



Now comes the question of the size of hives. If queens 

 can lay an average of 3,500 eggs per day, how many cells 

 will be needed to contain the brood of the colony, during the 

 spring breeding, previous to the honey crop? 



The egg is not usually changed into a worker-bee in less 

 than 21 days, from the time it is laid in the cell. Then we 

 need a number of cells equal to 8,500 multiplied by 21, or 

 73,500 cells, in addition to the cells that contain the indis- 

 pensable provisions — honey and pollen — which cannot be less 

 than 20,000 ; especially when we think that some cells must 

 of necessity remain empty at times, as the queen can surely 

 not find every empty cell every day. This gives us 93,500 

 cells as the number necessary for a good queen in a good 

 colony. 



We use a hive with large Quiuby frames containing 180 

 square inches each, which, at the rate of 55-worker-cells to 

 the square inch, gives us 9,900 cells to each frame, or 99,000 

 cells for the ten combs. This, from experience, we find is a 

 good size, and if we had to change it we would rather increase 

 than decrease it ; for a strong colony needs more room for 

 honey and pollen than a small colony does. 



If we now figure the number of cells contained in a 

 standard Langstroth frame, we find 7,800 cells to each comb, 

 or 78,000 cells for a ten-frame hive. Deducting 20,000 cells 

 for honey and pollen we have but 58,000 cells left for the 

 queen to breed. She is therefore compelled to limit her laying 

 to 2,800 eggs per day, or a little less. The reason why so 

 many people favor small hives is that they have never tried 

 large ones; most bee-keepers having considered the ten-frame 

 Langstroth hive as a large hive ; while it is what we call a 

 small one. 



The result is the opposite of what might be expected. 

 The colony, being small, winters with more loss, has less 

 honey in spring, the breeding begins later, the queen does not 

 become encouraged to lay as early and plentifully as she 

 otherwise should, and if the season has but a few good honey- 

 yielding days the bee-keeper decides that his hive is too large. 

 Thus we hear bee-keepers assert that the 8-frame hive is even 

 too large, and they want to try a 6-frame brood-chamber, 

 which would reduce each queen to less than the minimum 

 capacity. 



I have just read the last number of Gleanings, in which 

 Friend Doolittle favors the 8-frame hive. 



He says: "If a colony of bees having a good prolific 

 queen is given 30 Langstroth frames, using but eight to start 

 with, and adding two or three at a time, the bees can occupy 

 them, until the thirty are all in, it will be found that such a 

 queen will lay from 5,000 to 6,000 eggs per day during the 

 best part of the egg-laying season, and die of old age, or 

 exhaustion, when but 18 to 24 months old ; while with the 

 8-frame brood-chamber she will give as good results, in comb 

 honey, if not better, each year, and live four or five years." 



I have tried Quinby hives, 32 of them, with 14 frames, 

 having a capacity of about 139,000 cells, for a number of 

 years. I have a few of these hives yet, and I have never seen 

 a queen laying 126,000 eggs in 21 days, and it was after 

 trying all these experiments that I have concluded that 10 or 

 li Quinby frames were about the right number for a good 

 queen. But if there are queens that can lay that many as 

 Doolittle asserts, let us have them, and give them all the room 

 they can fill during the spring months ; for a queen of that 

 kind would give us a working capacity of more than twice the 

 average of the queens in small hives, and therefore a honey 

 crop more than doubled. The premature death of such a 

 queen, which Doolittle asserts would be the result of such 

 extraordinary laying, would not worry me, and should not 



