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tees. Quite often, when his locality 

 is already overstocked, he finds it is 

 his neighbors only who wish to buy, 

 ftnd at a price that barely repays him 

 for foundation and hives. 



Sometimes a person could profitably 

 keep one yard in connection with some 

 other business, if he knew how to man- 

 age them without increase, and with 

 the least expenditure of time and 

 work ; the time and work to be chiefly 

 given when the bee-keeper can best 

 ■spare it, and not at the call of the 

 bees. This method of running one 

 yard with some other occupation, and 

 the minimum amount of work and ex- 

 pense, may be the practice of the 

 future, one strong argument against 

 bee-keeping as a specialty being the 

 rancertain value of the business when 

 carried to a forced sale by the death of 

 the bee-keeper, and the consequent 

 tmcertain provision for the apiarist's 

 faniil)'. 



Then another very large class are 

 toow producing honej' at a greater cost 

 than tlie selling price, and it would be 

 unwise to enlarge a business alreadj' 

 conducted at a loss. And it is always 

 better to have the control of increase 

 like everything else, well in hand and 

 under well-laid plans, then a sufficient 

 number of hives and supplies can be 

 secured with some reasonable expecta- 

 tion of having them all used, and yet 

 have enough in those years in which 

 bees, when left to themselves, often 

 ■swarm to death. 



When running bees for extracted 

 honey, it is comparatively easy to con- 

 trol swarming ; for by giving them a 

 large amount of room for both brood 

 and honey, and extracting the old 

 honey, and afterward the new just be- 

 iore the main flow commences (as 

 ought to be done in any case, as it is 

 of inferior quality) there will usually 

 be no attempt to swarm ; with reason- 

 able attention to extracting aftervvai'd. 

 This method is simple, and it would be 

 well if beginners would stick to the 

 extractor until they are successful with 

 comb honey management. 



When comb honey is produced it is 

 much more difficult to control increase. 

 It is casj' in a swarming jear to rear a 

 crop of swarms, but not so easy to pro- 

 duce a crop of comb honey. The well- 

 filled brood-nest so necessarj- to the 

 successful production of comb honey 

 is also very favorable to the forcing 

 out of swarms. 



A large hive well shaded and venti- 

 lated, with plenty of room in both 

 brood and surplus apartments, will re- 

 tard and sometimes prevent the issue 

 of swarms, but there is no certainty 

 about it, and it is better to have 

 swarms issue eai'lier than in the mid- 

 dle of the honey harvest, as is apt to 

 be the case with large hives. 



Cutting out queen-cells, the with- 

 drawal of brood, and the management 

 of the bnjod-chamber as recommended 

 by Mr. Simmins, will also delay but 

 not prevent swarming, while there is 

 danger of throwing the colony into a 

 condition known as having the 

 " swarming fever." In this state work 

 to a large degree will be suspended, 

 and the bees show by unmistable signs 

 that they are dissatisfied. Many bees 

 will desert their own hives and enter 

 others, which seems to disaft'ect these 

 also. The bee-keeper will be similarly 

 aflected when in the midst of a honey 

 flow he comes to look into the surplus 

 receptacles, or to notice the number of 

 idle bees hanging about the hives. It 

 is only strong colonies that produce 

 comb honey satisfactorily, and no sys- 

 tem of management will be successful 

 unless the colonies are built up strong 

 before the harvest. This is particu- 

 larly true of the method I am about 

 to describe. 



I recommend the clipping of the 

 queens' wings, believing it to be the 

 best. There is then no loss of unex- 

 pected swarms, and no swarms to be 

 hived from inaccessible places. In 

 every apiary there are some colonies 

 (in some seasons a majorit}') that will 

 work right along without any attempt 

 to swarm. When no increase is de- 

 sired, there is no need of molesting 

 them, as they usually produce their 

 full share of comb honey. All other 

 colonies, as they complete their prep- 

 arations for swarming, should have 

 their queens removed with one or 

 more sheets of brood, and enough 

 workers to protect it, and be placed in 

 another hive or small receptacle pro- 

 vided for her. All queen-cells old 

 enough to hatch within nine days 

 should be removed from tlie old col- 

 ony, and the remaining brood-combs 

 pushed together,contractingthe brood- 

 nest that much. 



On the eiglith or ninth day after, all 

 cells should be broken from the now 

 queenless hive, leaving them hopelessly 

 queenless. In a week or ten days 

 longer, the old queen may be smoked 

 back into the old hive. The success 

 of this will depend somewhat upon the 

 race of bees kept. When I had black 

 bees there was seldom a failure, but as 

 my bees became Italianized, the losses 

 were greater. 



Mr. Crane, one of the best bee-keep- 

 ers in the country, takes this time to 

 re-queen the most of his colonies bj- 

 giving them a virgin queen, which is 

 usually well received. If the queen is 

 to be changed, the old queen can be 

 killed at the time of her removal, and 

 the brood-nest not contracted. The 

 brood removed maj' also be retiu'ned 

 to the old hive, or it may be used for 

 nuclei, or put into extracting colonies, 



or used in a variety of ways that may 

 suggest themselves to the average bee- 

 keeper. 



No colony should be left queenless 

 longer than 21 days, as after the brood 

 has all hatched, there may be no 

 empty cells _ for storing pollen except 

 in the sections. If the queen-cells are 

 broken out at the end of seven days 

 after the removal of the queen, there 

 will often be another brood of queens 

 reared from the tjrood remaining. I 

 have never known such queens to lay 

 anything except drone-eggs ; but they 

 are capable of leading ofl' swarms, or 

 of establishing a monarchy in the old 

 hive that is hard to overthrow. Before 

 I learned that the books were not right 

 as to the time for breaking out cells to 

 make a colony hopelessly queenless, I 

 had many such cases, and this is the 

 only kind of " fertile worker " I have 

 ever been troubled wdth. 



This system of non-swarming works 

 well with me, and vindoubtedly will do 

 the same in localities having a similar 

 honej'-flow. In other sections, modifi- 

 cations of the plan maj' be adopted to 

 meet the varying circumstances. With 

 sectional hives like the Heddon, a 

 whole half of tlie brood-chamber might 

 be taken with the queen and returned 

 with the queen at the proper time, 

 which, with me, is usually near the 

 close of the white honey harvest. Or 

 the sections might be changed, leaving 

 the queen out longer than the 21 days. 



It is said that queenless colonies do 

 not work so well, but 1 by this method 

 get extra strong colonies, and as much 

 honey as by other methods, with less 

 work and expense. 



This method of non-swarming is not 

 recommended after a short trial, for it 

 has been worked for several years with 

 thousands of swarms in difi'erent bee- 

 keepers' hands, and tons of honej' pro- 

 duced. In answer to the objection, 

 that honey produced b}" queenless col- 

 onies is not as choice as that produced 

 otherwise, I will saj', that lioney so 

 produced took the highest prize at the 

 Centennial in 1876, and later at the 

 Paris Exposition, after having been 

 carried across the ocean and exhibited 

 in the original packages. 



In the fall 1 have not found the 

 brood-chambers of such hives any 

 heavier on the average than others, 

 neither have I or other bee-keepers 

 discovered that such colonies failed in 

 winter because of too much bee-bread. 

 With reasonaljlc attention we are sure 

 of having no swarms issue, and I know 

 of no other way by which we can uni- 

 formly reach the same result. 



Starkville, N. Y. 



Your Full Address, plainly written, 

 is very essential in order to avoid mistakes. 



