THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW, 



167 



be killed as there is no place in which to put 

 them. Could the laying queens have been 

 taken out and in some way safely kept until 

 orders came for them, the profits would have 

 been doubled during those two weeks. I re- 

 member one time in particular in which I 

 had scarcely an order for two weeks, and 

 then there came a day in which I shipped 

 sixty queens, orders for half of them coming 

 in one mail, but during those two weeks I 

 probably killed as many as sixty young 

 queens, possibly more, and every one would 

 have brought nearly a dollar if it could have 

 been saved. I think that most breeders have 

 had similar experiences. I often tried divid- 

 ing up the nuclei, but robbing and swarm- 

 ing out put an end to this plan. It seems, 

 however, that Mrs. Atchley has found a plan 

 for keeping laying queens in perfect health 

 with only from fifty to one hundred workers, 

 and at the same time there is no loss from 

 swarming-out or from robbers, at least, here 

 is what she says : 



" For the last two years I have not had a 

 chance to put in practice my plans ; but I 

 have tried them sufficiently to know that it 

 is an excellent way to keep queens that we 

 have no immediate use for, and at the same 

 time we wish to keep the nuclei at work rais- 

 ing queens as fast as the young queens have 

 laid two or three combs of eggs. I used to 

 keep them caged on a table, ready to go at a 

 moment's notice, when an order came. Well, 

 sometimes orders did not come for several 

 days, and my queens, of course, were more 

 or less injured if kept too long in this way ; 

 and to make it profitable we can not afford 

 to let the nuclei keep their queens till orders 

 come to take them. To overcotne this trou- 

 ble I went to work and constructed a lot of 

 small hives, just large enough to hold two 

 sections 434 inches square by IJg inchs wide. 

 All these sections that we had unfinished we 

 laid by to go in our little nuclei. Now, we 

 could take from fifty to one hundred work- 

 ers, or enough to keep the queen in good 

 shape. It is no trouble to speak of, to pre- 

 pare two or three hundred of these little 

 nuclei, something after the little Alley nuclei. 

 We may use little frames if we choose. I 

 use the sections, as they usually have plenty 

 of honey to last the queen and bees a month 

 or more, and the queen will go to laying, and 

 assume the same attitude as a large colony. 

 Then the queen is never so filled with eggs 

 that it would be dangerous to cage and mail 

 her right off. I do not like to cage and mail 

 a queen that is in full laying plight without 

 giving her time to unload herself of eggs. 

 Well, the little-nuclei plan has the queens in 

 good shape to be mailed at once without any 

 danger of being injured. 



To keep the queens and bees from swarm- 

 ing-out I use, over the entrance, one perfor- 

 ation of queen-excluder zinc, and robber 

 bees will never enter through the zinc to 



amount to anything. These little hives can 

 be placed on a shelf in the shade, moderate- 

 ly close together. We may make a record of 

 where each queen was taken from ; and if we 

 keep any of them long enough they can be 

 tested, and all the finest ones selected to fill 

 orders for select queens. Robbers have nev- 

 er bothered our little hives, as we seldom 

 have a surplus of queens till the weather gets 

 warm and honey is coming in so there is no 

 danger of robbers. I do not like the idea of 

 raising queens in little hives, as the queen 

 and bees are too likely to swarm out, as we 

 cannot keep excluding zinc on till the queens 

 have mated, which gives them every chance 

 to leave. If the bees should take a notion 

 to swarm out of the little hives, where our 

 laying queens are, there will always be bees 

 enough return to be a good retinue for the 

 queen. Then these little nuclei are good to 

 introduce another queen to as soon as one is 

 sold out. I think I can raise a third more 

 queens with a given number of nuclei by this 

 method. These little hives can be made 

 cheaply at the factories, as scraps will an- 

 swer for them. If you do not think this a 

 good way to keep your surplus queens, just 

 try it. 



Beeville, Texas, Jan. 27." 



It seems to me that a Heddou super would 

 be an excellent thing to use for a hive for 

 these little section-nuclei. Eight, or even 

 ten, of these little clusters could be kept in 

 one of these supers. I think I shall try it 

 this summer, just for the fun of it, if for 

 nothing more. 



A Condensed View of Current 

 Bee Writings. 



E. E. HASTY. 



PROMISING, very promising is that meth- 

 od of dealing with foul brood which 

 comrade Baldridge brings out in last Re- 

 view ; yet we get bitten so often when we 

 say that a new method will succeed " of 

 course," that perhaps we might postpone 

 crowning him one of the benefactors of api- 

 culture until a more extensive trial of the 

 plan is had. To be crowned, and then a few 

 weeks later to have the crown yanked off 

 (scalp along with it) is no fun. Fortunately 

 the new plan is easy enough, and attractive 

 enough to secure it a trial ; and with the 

 trials the merits or demerits of the thing will 

 come to the front. One of the best things 

 about it is that when reasonable care is ex- 

 ercised surrounding bees are so little exposed 

 to any risk. 



Ah, yes ! and there's comrade B. Taylor's 

 plan for securing a supply of sections al- 



