1138 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Sept. 1 



rob, one or more of the queens would disap- 

 pear, until only one was left. We base this 

 supposition on an experience we have had 

 where mother and daughter have lived in 

 peace for months, and both doing duty. 

 After the honey season one of them ( the old- 

 er one) will be gone, and this can hardly be 

 explained on the ground that she died of old 

 age; for why should she not die in the height 

 of the season when she is laying at her best? 

 It is significant that the one queen always 

 "comes up missing" during the time there 

 is a dearth of honey, when both are taking a 

 vacation. Why is this? 



With no thought of discrediting Mr. Alex- 

 ander's work, we should like to have him 

 tell us in his next how long he has been able 

 to keep a bunch of queens like this in one 

 hive, and whether there is a tendency for one 

 or more of them to disappear after the hon- 

 ey-flow, and when bees are simply "horrid," 

 to put it mildly. 



We sincerely hope he can keep the whole 

 thing going, year in and year out. The pos- 

 sibilities would be great. In the mean time, 

 if any one else has any thing to offer we 

 should like to hear from him.— Ed.] 



COMPARATIVE WEIGHTS OF HONEY 

 AND COMB. 



Shallow Brood-sections. 



BY ERNEST C. BLODGETT. 



1. When sections weigh 16 oz., including 

 the wax, honey, and wood, what is the aver- 

 age weight of the honey? 



2. How much honey is consumed in build- 

 ing comb to hold 100 pounds of honey? How 

 many pounds of honey will a pound of new 

 comb hold? 



3. Suppose the brood of a colony is in shal- 

 low frames. If there were plenty of room 

 above, would the colony be more apt to 

 swarm if a queen-excluder were placed over 

 the brood? 



4. Is it ever best to kill old bees after the 

 honey-flow? 



5. Will bees winter as well in a hive made 

 of two shallow extracting-supers as in a reg- 

 ular Langstroth hive? 



Putney, Vt. 



[It is pretty hard to answer these questions 

 definitely, as so much depends upon various 

 conditions. For instance, the amount of wax 

 in combs depends upon whether full sheets 

 of foundation are used, and also the grade 

 used. The answers, therefore, are only ap- 

 proximately correct. 



1. A section that weighs 16 ounces, includ- 

 ing the comb and the section, holds about 14 

 ounces of honey. We selected a section of a 

 known weight, and pressed the honey out 

 very carefully, saving both the honey and the 

 wax. We found that there was about i ounce 

 of wax, a little over 14 ounces of honey, and 

 one ounce of wood in the section. The il- 

 lustration shows the empty section, the hon- 

 ey obtained, and the wax from the comb and 

 oappings. 



2. Estimates vary considerably as to the 

 amount of honey consumed to produce one 

 pound of wax; but as you will see in the A 

 B C of Bee Culture it takes anywhere from 

 7 to 15 pounds to produce one pound of wax. 

 About four pounds of wax in comb would be 

 necessary to hold 100 pounds of honey. You 

 will see, then, that a pound of new comb 

 would hold about 25 pounds of honey. 



HONEY PRESSED FROM A SECTION; RESULT — 



OVER 14 OZ. HONEY, | OZ. WAX, 



1 OZ. OF WOOD. 



3. The bees are not apt to swarm with 

 plenty of room above the brood in shallow 

 frames, even though a queen-excluding hon- 

 ey-board is placed above the brood. As a 

 rule, however, a colony is a little more like- 

 ly to swarm when the honey- boai'd is used. 



4. You would not need to bother about 

 killing the oldest bees after the honey-flow, 

 for these will soon die any way, and you 

 would only weaken the colony by trying to 

 kill some of the bees. 



5. There is no reason why they shouldn't 

 winter just as well and probably a little bet- 

 ter because of the horizontal bee-space through 

 which the bees could pass from one comb to 

 the other. — Ed.] 



THOUSANDS OF COLONIES FAILED TO 

 RENEW THEIR QUEEN. 



BY WM. McEVOY. 



The past spring was the worst ever known 

 in the Province of Ontario for "spring 

 dwindling;" and from the reports I read in 

 the bee-journals I believe the dwindling was 

 almost as bad in Uncle Sam's domain. Near- 

 ly every one of these colonies which took so 

 long to build up have their old queens still 

 on hand. Now, this is a serious state of af- 

 fairs, and one that requires prompt attention, 

 because the most of these queens will be too 

 old to be of much value for the next honey 

 harvest. I would requeen all of these and 

 every colony that has an old queen. I raise 

 and buy queens, and requeen every year. 

 The queens that I buy don't cost me any 

 thing, because they more than pay for them- 

 selves in one year in the extra amount of 

 honey. 



I don't raise any queens for sale. About 

 90 per cent of the queens in use should be 

 wiped out for better ones. 



Woodburn, Ont., Aug. 5. 



