1919 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL 



155 



Acting upon this mental deduction 

 I set out a few years back to devise a 

 shipping-case for the bees in which 

 darkness was the first consideration. 

 For two seasons this case has been in 

 use by me, and its use has been at- 

 tended by phenomenal results. Such 

 statements in the letters from my cus- 

 tomers as follow are not uncommon : 

 "There was not a dead bee ;" There 

 were not to exceed 25 dead bees in 

 the entire ten packages;" "The bees 

 were so quiet that I thought they 

 were dead until I opened up the 

 package." This cage or shipping- 

 case is under process of patenting 

 and will soon be put upon the mar- 

 ket. In a later article the case will 

 be described, accompanied by photo- 

 graphs of the same. For the present 

 I will merely say that the case is 

 made of wooden walls instead of 

 wire-cloth. The bees can get air as 

 they desire it, but no currents of air 

 strike them, and no light. Ninety- 

 nine per cent of the bees remain 

 quietly clustered, a few only are al- 

 ways seeking an exit to the outside 

 world. During the trip small patches 

 of comb are built and the queen is 

 usually laying in the same. 



The number of bees seeking an exit 

 depends very largely upon how the 

 bees are put up. If only young bees 

 are caged, very few bees are restless 

 during the journey. Old bees should 

 never be put in with the others. The 

 writer has every confidence in this 

 shipping-case, and predicts a prosper- 

 ous future for the pound package. 

 With this case in use one can rest 

 assured that the packages of bees 

 will arrive in perfect shape, barring 

 accident. Accidents we cannot con- 

 trol, but with this cage we need only 

 to be certain that proper food and 

 proper bees go into the case in order 

 to feel assured that the buyer will be 

 pleased with the goods upon their ar- 

 rival. 

 Norwich, Conn. 



— A Lady Expert With Bees 



I have just returned from a trip to 

 one of the other islands, where Miss 

 Mae Brown (who has complete 

 charge of our queen breeding and re- 

 queening operations) was in the act 

 of requeening 2273 colonies of bees. 

 I stayed with her watching the pro- 

 cess for nearly five weeks. 



In five days after she arrived at 

 the apiaries she had put queen-cells 

 into seventy-one colonies of bees. 

 The queens had previously been re- 

 moved from these seventy-one colo- 

 nies, and they accepted 941 buds of 

 the lot that she put in. To take 

 care of these 941 queen buds on the 

 9th day, or before the young queens 

 emerged, required a great deal of 

 work in searching out and killing old 

 queens, etc. However, she began 

 this work two days earlier with her 

 usual staff of four Japanese men, and 

 it was a real pleasure watching them 

 work. Through the whole process 

 they were striving to outdo each 

 other in finding queens, while Miss 

 Brown kept her note book and sciss- 

 ors on hand. The note book con- 

 tained data on each of the old queens 

 and it was necessary to make some 

 new entries for future use, while the 

 scissors were used for clipping the 

 wing of any queen that should need 

 it. In this way she was able to ex- 

 amine an average of 350 queens per 

 day, as well as introduce the buds as 

 they came along on the ninth day. In 

 the meantime extra buds had been 

 put into these first mentioned 71 colo- 

 nies, as she required several hundred 

 additional cells to complete the work. 

 She generally kills 50 per cent of the 

 old queens so that all are requeened 

 every two years. 



Most of these young queens were 

 laying when I left the work. As 

 she was searching for these young 

 queens to examine their condition 

 and clip their wings before closing 

 up the lower box, or brood-nest for 

 the year, I had the pleasure of see- 

 ing as fine a lot of young Golden 

 Italian queens as it is the lot of man 

 to see. 



Just before leaving for home I had 

 Miss Mae Brown stand with her 

 four Japanese men while I took a 

 snap shot of them. Inclosed you 

 will find a copy of the same. 



E. C. SMITH, 

 Honolulu, T. H. 

 (Queen buds is a term used in Ha- 

 waii for queen-cells. — Ed.) 



Bees to Japan 



1. Can I take a few Italian queen 

 bees to Japan in May? It takes 17 

 days for the voyage. 



2. Will you tell me how I should 

 pack them? R. H. W. 



Los 'Angeles, Calif. 



Answer. — The dealers in bees and 

 supplies sell "long-distance mailing 

 cages" at 10 cents each. These are 

 provisioned with candy for the trip. 

 Put a queen in each and place with 

 her a fair number of bees, enough to 

 occupy the cage without crowding. 

 The bees to take for that purpose are 

 bees that are active field workers, 

 but not too old. Old bees are recog- 

 nized by their shiny looks. The young 

 bees have more hairs and look fuller. 

 Take them as they come home from 

 the field and you will be sure not to 

 make a mistake. But if you are ac- 

 quainted with bees, you may take 

 them from the inside of the hive. 

 You should make sure that you do 

 not take young bees that have never 

 yet had a flight. 



For the transportation, keep them 

 in a place where they will have warm 

 air, not below 65 degrees; no light, 

 no disturbance. Do not handle them 

 any more than you can help, and 

 when you reach your destination in- 

 troduce' them to colonies as early as 

 possible. We have kept bees a month 

 in this way, with very little loss. If 

 the candy is so dry that they cut out 

 particles of it and it falls out of 

 the cage, moisten the cage slightly 

 with your finger wet with water. 

 Otherwise do not give them any 

 water; they do not need it, when 

 their food is of the proper con- 

 sistency. Water is needed only for 

 brood-rearing. — C. P. D. 



Miss Brown and four Japanese assistants 



