1919 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



61 



Nininger, Roy Bunger, Harry A. 

 Huff, L. V. Rhine and C. A. Baxter 

 are among the number. 



Obituary 



We are sorry to announce the death 

 on the 29th of December, at Oakland, 

 Calif., of W. A. Pryal, the well-known 

 beekeeper and writer. Mr. Pryal 



was a constant contributor to the 

 American Bee Journal, the last arti- 

 cle from his pen having been pub- 

 lished in the December number, page 

 405. 



Mr. Pryal, we are told, was sick 

 about six weeks, but his demise was 

 altogether unexpected, s he was only 

 62 years old and still in his prime. 



Dr. Miller's $& Answers* 



J 



Send Questions either to the office of the American Bee Journal or direct to 



Dr. C. C. Miller, Marengo. Ilv 



He does not answer bee-keeoine Questions by mail. 



Miscellaneous Questions 



1. How many trips will it take for a bee to 

 fill a cell with honey, on an average? 



2. Is it best to requeen in spring, or fall? 



3. When I try to unite weak colonies they 

 kill out one or the other. How shall I pre- 

 vent it? 



5. Is it best to have a cloth between cover 

 and top of frames here in the warm climate 

 of southwest Texas? 



6. Will it pay to use queen excluders on all 

 hives, and which is best, zinc, wire or wood? 



7. I have 21 colonies and have bought four 

 Italian queens. Now, can I Italianize my 

 small apiary next spring from queen cells 

 from these 4 hives, or even one of the best 

 ones? TEXAS. 



Answers. — 1. I don't know. It has been es- 

 timated that in order to carry in a pound of 

 nectar, 20,000 trips would have to be made. 



2. Perhaps in fall, as a rule, or rather about 

 the close of the honey-flow. Yet, if one were 

 requeening for the sake of getting in new 

 stock, it would hardly be advisable to wait till 

 the fall of next year, but rather to act in the 

 spring. 



3. One way is to take empty hives and put 

 into it the frames with adhering bees from 

 each hive alternately. Perhaps a better way 

 is to put over the top-bars of one of the hives 

 a sheet of newspaper and set over this the 

 other hive, allowing the bees to gnaw a hole 

 through the paper and unite at their leisure. 



4. Strictly speaking, a division board is one 

 which closes one part of the hive from an- 

 other, not allowing bees to pass. It is of use 

 to separate the hive into two parts when you 

 want to have two or more nuclei in one hive, 

 or when you want to confine a colony to a 

 smaller space. If the board is small enough 

 to allow the bees to pass on all sides, it is 

 called a dummy. It may be used at any time 

 to fill up vacant space, but is perhaps chiefly 

 useful at one side of the hive to make it easier 

 to take out the first comb. 



5. It depends upon the space above top. -bars 

 If it is more than about a quarter of an inch, 

 then it is better to have cloth, so as to prevent 

 combs being built in the space. I should pre- 

 fer to have only beespace above the frames, so 

 as to do without the cloth. 



6. For section honey I never used exclud- 

 ers, but most beekeepers use them for ex- 

 tracting. Wire excluders are probably best. 



7. Yes, indeed; if you had 100 colonies you 

 could requeen all from one queen. 



Wintering Bees in a Small Building 



I have five colonies which I am thinking of 

 wintering in a small building. Do you think 

 the colonies could be safely stacked on one 

 another? 



If the door was left open on warm days, 

 would the bees be apt to mark their new lo- 

 cation and make their flights in safety, or 

 would it be the best plan to have them shut 

 up until early spring? 



What would be the best time in spring to 

 remove them? ILLINOIS. 



Answer. — The stacking on one another is 

 all right, but wintering in a building above 



ground is not much in favor if there is no 

 direct opening to allow the bees to fly when- 

 ever the weather favors. Still, with only five 

 colonies, it may be that they can be near the 

 door, facing outward, so that when the door 

 is opened they will be about the same as out 

 of the building. But if they are where they 

 will be partly in the dark, even when the door 

 is opened, then it may be better to leave them 

 until a warm day in March or April. But if 

 it keeps down to about freezing in such a 

 room, then they might better be outdoors. 



Confining Foulbrood Bees 



1. I have a few colonies of bees with Ameri- 

 can foulbrood to be treated when the proper 

 time arrives. I propose to shake bees on 

 frames with full sheets of foundation and con- 

 fine them two or three days, thus compelling 

 them to consume every bit of foulbrood honey 

 which may be in their honey sacs. 



Do you think my plan is a good one ? If 

 not, what objections would you have? 



ONTARIO. 



Answer. — If- I understand correctly, your 

 departure from the usual plan of shaking or 

 brushing is that instead of leaving the bees 

 to fly you will confine them in the hive, your 

 idea being that they will use up all the bad 

 honey in their sacs before they fly. I don't 

 know for sure, but I don't believe you'll like 

 the plan. As long as they will use up the 

 honey in their sacs anyhow, what will you gain 

 by an irritating imprisonment? Not being 

 in a very happy frame of mind, it would not 

 be surprising if they should swarm out when 

 freed. 



Wintering — Colony Without Queen 

 for Winter 



1. On page 350, October American Bee Jour- 

 nal, column 2, answer 2, you say later on you 

 will crowd them to one story. Why not (if 

 they were to be united on their summer 

 stands) leave them in two stories? 



2. I believe you use honey in hot drinks, 

 do you think the heat kills those little germs 

 that you tell us live in honey; I believe you 

 call them vitamins? 



3. We are told to put something over the 

 top-bars of the frames in covering our bees for 

 winter, so that the bees climb over from one 

 comb to another. How do they get over in a 

 tree or other places where no man interferes? 



4. I found a dead queen on the alighting- 

 board November 10. Would you try to give 

 that colony a new one as late in the season as 

 this, or will the bees live until spring and ac- 

 cept of a new one then, and will those old 

 bees care for brood at this time? 



NEBRASKA. 



Answers. — 1. But they are not to be left 

 on their summer stands, for they are to be — 

 rather have been — carried into the cellar. If 

 they were to be left on their summer stands 

 it might do to have them left in two stories; 

 but the point I was making is that one story 

 is enough to hold them. 



2. I don't know, but it is possible the 

 vitamins are destroyed by heat. Still there is 

 left the advantage that no inversion of sugar 

 in the honey is needed, it being already in- 

 verted, and also the advantage of the minerals 



in honey that are entirely wanting in ordinary 

 sugar. 



3. I'm not greatly interested in what bees do 

 in trees, for my bees are not in trees. Indeed, 

 I am not interested in putting anything over 

 top-bars to allow the bees to pass over, for my 

 bees have ample opportunity to pass from one 

 comb to another, since the hives are taken into 

 cellar just as they were on their summer 

 stands, there being always a bee-space between 

 top-bars and hive-covers. If bees in trees can- 

 not easily pass from one comb to another, so 

 much the worse for the bee* in trees. It isn't 

 always best to follow nature too closely; our 

 chickens are better off in a good hen-house 

 than roosting in trees in zero weather. I 

 think, however, that when bees build combs in 

 trees you will generally find that they leave 

 plenty of chances for getting from one comb 

 to another, not always at top, but a little far- 

 ther down, which is perhaps better. 



4. I think I would let them alone till 

 spring. It is not certain they are queenless, 

 but entirely possible that the dead queen has 

 been superseded uy one of her daughters. 



Nuclei for Queen Rearing 



I wish to rear my own queens. I propose 

 to rear them in 2-frame nuclei, that is to say, 

 from each colony I will take two rrames of 

 bees and brood, giving to same a ripe cell 

 from approved stock. 



What I want to know is, can I keep such 

 small colonies on two frames from, say second 

 week of July to about first week of September, 

 without them swarming out? 



Describe the simplest way to return the two 

 combs of bees an brood to the hive from 

 whence they were taken. 



You see, my objet is to requeen, but I 

 want to do it after the harvest is over, so I 

 will have more time and also not interfere 

 with the honey crop. 



What worries me is the bees of the small 

 nucl-i returning to their old locations, and the 

 possibility of starting an offensive, when re- 

 turning the two combs of bees, brood and 

 queens to old parent stock. ONTARIO. 



Answer. — If from a normal colony you 

 take two frames of brood with adhering bees, 

 and put them in a hive on a new stand, you 

 will find in a few days some of the brood neg- 

 lected because there are too few bees to cover 

 it, if, indeed, the whole of the bees have not 

 stampeded. If you imprison the bees for about 

 three days, there may be no trouble. Queen- 

 less bees will stay where they are put better 

 than queenright ones. The larger the number 

 of bees in a nucleus the better they will stay 

 in a new place. If you are going to make a 

 number of nuclei at one time, a good way is 

 to put on one stand all the frames you are 

 going to use, together with their adhering 

 bees, if necessary piling them two stories or 

 more high. With each pair of combs better 

 brush into the hive the bees from another 

 comb. No need to imprison the bees. In S 

 or 4 days distribute the combs to their re- 

 spective places, and if you have been liberal 

 in the amount of bees there will be no seri- 

 ous trouble from returning bees. 



If you try to keep each nucleus restricted 

 to two frames, there is likely to be swarming 

 galore. But if you give them room enough 

 there will be no trouble. 



The simplest way to return the nuclei 

 later in the season to the hives from which 

 they were taken is to return them. There 

 should be jo danger of fighting. But will you 

 want thus to return them? At the time you 

 took two frames from each colony, of course 

 you replaced them with other frames, and it 

 will not be advisable to disturb them later. 

 Better unite the nuclei to make one or more 

 strong colonies. 



(The queens may be introduced in the usual 

 way. — Eaitor.) 



Good Locations — Package Bees 



1. Where do you think would be the best 



