144 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



The Langdon, Non-Swarming Device. 



For several mouths I have known that 

 Mr. H. P. Laugdon, of East Constable, K. 

 Y., last year devised and put into successful 

 practice a device for preventing swarming. 

 It was used in connection with his house 

 apiary described in the last Review. It is 

 not until now that Mr. Langdon 's arrange- 

 ments for patenting have reached that stage 

 where he is ready to publish a description. 

 The following is an extract from an article 

 written by Frank Benton and printed in Vol. 

 V, No. 4, of Insect Life, a journal published 

 by the Agricultural Department at Washing- 

 ton. D. C. I hereby thank this journal for 

 courtesies extended in the way of furnishing 

 advance proofs and cuts. 



'•Although the self-hiver in its more per- 

 fected form has scarcely been subjected to a 



The immediate condition which incites a 

 colony of bees to swarm has been quite well 

 recognized as its general prosperity — its 

 populousness, the abundance of honey secre- 

 tion, and crowded condition of the brood 

 combs, or, in general, such circumstances as 

 favor the production of surplus honey es- 

 pecially surplus comb honey, and it has of 

 course been taken for granted that honey 

 could not be secured if these conditions were 

 changed. Nor would it, without any knowl- 

 edge of the system proposed by Mr. Lang- 

 don, be easy for experienced bee-keepers to 

 believe that all it proposes to do could be 

 accomplished without much manipulation 

 and perhaps also the use of some complica- 

 ted device. I was, however, agreeably sur- 

 prised at the whole simplicity of Mr. Lang- 

 don's plan, when, in December last, he made 

 it known to me and sent a non-swarmer for 

 purposes of illustration. And in answer to 

 the request as to what I thought of it, I wrote 

 him at once that I was of the opinion that he 

 had made one of the most valuable additions 



Fig. 31.— Bee Hives with Langdon non-ewarmer attached : A, B, hives; 8. S' Ruoers; D, non-swarm- 

 ing device; e, e' entrances corresponding to hive entances; si, slide for closing entrance ; c, c', 

 conical, wire cloth bee escapes ; ex', exits of same. 



thorough test it promises to do all that has 

 been expected of it. But it will not take 

 away the desire to swarm. 



This is exactly what Mr. H. P. Laugdon, 

 of East Constable, N. Y., says he can do by 

 the use of the non-swarming attachment in- 

 vented by him and now for the tirst time 

 made public. Moreover, he keeps all of the 

 field force of his colonies storing surplus 

 honey under the most favorable conditions 

 as long as there is any honey to be obtained 

 in the field or forest, and simplifies to such 

 an extent the work of the apiary during this 

 portion of the year that he can attend to 

 several times as many colonines as under the 

 old way. 



to the list of apiarian inventions that had 

 appeared in a long time — one that, after the 

 frame hive, would rank equal with or ahead 

 of the honey-extractor and comb-foundation 

 machine. 



Mr. Laugdon has applied for letters patent 

 on his device in this and other countries, 

 and with the specifications as a f)asis, a copy 

 of which he has kindly sent to me, together 

 with permission to make the matter public, 

 I have written the following description of 

 the device and system. 



At the ijeginning of the honey season the 

 non-swarming device D, shown in Fig. 31, i.s 

 placed at the entrance of two contiguous 

 hives each of which contains a queen and 



