58 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



for comb honey, and extracting going on 

 every third or fonrth day from the other, 

 as used to be the style under which ex- 

 tracting was done. In the tiered-iip 

 hive, the queen was kept on the 9 frames 

 by means of a slatted honey-board, and 

 the one worked on the side and top-box 

 plan manipulated as well as Doolittle 

 knew how. Now for the result: Before 

 the basswood harvest arrived, the queen 

 in the long hive, worked for extracted 

 honey, had brood in every one of the 32 

 combs, to the amount of some 18 or 20 

 comhs/ull of brood; while the one work- 

 ed for comb honey, having 32 combs, had 

 brood in only 13 combs, the same amount- 

 ing to only about 9 frames^)///, the rest 

 of the combs being partly occupied with 

 honey, which ought to have gone in the 

 sections, and would have gone there had 

 this queen had only the 9 combs for her 

 brood nest. So the queen from the ex- 

 tracting-hive was laying about 5000 eggs 

 daily, as Dr. Miller says, to where the 

 one in the comb-honey hive was giving 

 only about 2500, each evidently laying to 

 her fullest capacity. What made the 

 difference? There is something about 

 extracting honey that causes bees to /red 

 a queen in such a way that she will give 

 double the eggs, if she has the comb room, 

 that she will when no extracting is done, 

 and thus a queen is coaxed to produce 

 and develop all the embryo eggs she has 

 in her ovaries, in the shortest possible 

 time, while under normal circumstances 

 she will be laying up to her fullest capa- 

 city when not producing half the number 

 of eggs she does under the stimulating 

 influences which come from extracting. 



All four of these queens were reared 

 during the swarming season of 1873, so 

 they were less than a year old when the 

 experiment was commenced; but the one 

 in the long extracting-hive died of old 

 age that same fall, while the other three 

 lived and did good work the next season. 

 I have tried nearl}- the same thing sever- 

 al times since, and proven to my entire 

 satisfaction that a queen will occupy 

 double the number of combs with brood, 

 where extracting is being carried on, as 

 often as the combs are filled with honey, 

 that she will when her colony is worked 

 for comb honey. 



In passing I will note that the hive 

 worked for extracted honey on the long- 

 idea plan gave 566 lbs. surplus, while the 

 one worked on the tiering-up plan ga\e 

 about 400 lbs. , thus showing that I had 

 only 166 lbs. more honey as a result for 

 double the brood reared. The long hive 

 worked for comb honey gave onh^ about 

 50 lbs. of section honey, with the 32 combs 



nearly solid full of honey, while the one 

 worked on the side and top storing 

 plan gave 309 lbs. of section honey, with 

 enough below to winter the colony on. 

 The average from the whole apiary that 

 year was 166-3 pounds from each old col- 

 ony in the spring, all of which was comb 

 honey, excepting that from the two colo- 

 nies worked for extracted, the whole 

 number in the apiary in the spring being 

 69. 



Now just a word more: I do not get, on 

 an average, any more brood in the ten- 

 frame Langstroth hives at the out-apiary 

 than I do in my nine-frame Gallup hives 

 here at home. To be sure, I often have 

 brood in the whole ten-frames, but not 

 more than enough to fill from six to seven 

 full, while the nine Gallup frames are 

 J'kU clear out to the corners, a Ernest 

 says the Holy Land and Cyprian queens 

 will do. Now if, when working for comb 

 honey, I get to the amoimt of only 6^^ 

 Langstroth frames of brood out of ten 

 frames, or 9 Gallup where I use 12, 18, 24, 

 or 32 in a hive, will Dr. Miller say that 

 9 Gallup frames or 6^4 L. frames will not ^ 

 entertain any queen to her fullest capacity 

 in this locality? And allow me to saj', in 

 a voy jyicndly way, that I am inclined to 

 think that what is applicable to my local- 

 ity will come very nearly the truth in 

 other localities, if others will work along 

 the same lines Doolittle does, and exper- 

 iment, and note things as carefully. 



DOOLlTTIvE .ANSWERS THE EDITOR. 



And now I come to another Straw (p. 

 870) where the editor wishes me to ex- 

 plain. And that "twinkle" in Dr. Mil- 

 ler's "eye" caused him to wish the ex- 

 planation. It's not very often that the 

 doctor gets in two "twinkles" at Doolittle 

 in one batch of Straws, as he has this time. 

 The editor points me to his answer to 

 "Straw regarding Dadant's statement to 

 the effect that queens will lose time in 

 hunting for empty cells" where she has 

 just room enough for her needs, but for 

 the life of me I can not tell whether he 

 agrees with Dadant or not. As Dadant 

 uses only laroe hives, I doubt whether, 

 from practical experience, he is capable 

 of telling just how much a queen hunts 

 about for room, unless he has seen her 

 doing so, because his large hives allow 

 the bees to crowd the queen with hone}^ 

 (when working for section honey) by 

 their starting storing in the combs below 

 instead of entering the section proviptly 

 with the beginning of the season, as they 

 should do. If the queen does so hunt I 

 have never been able to detect her so do- 

 ing; for where frames are filled solid with 



