THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



M9 



him how I built up three colonies into 30, 

 and wintered them successfully. I ilid 

 this by the use of foundation and laying 

 queens. 5lr. Morgan shows how to make 

 seven colonies from one, and not use an}- 

 foundation, nor any laying queens. His 

 plun strikes me as quite novel, original 

 and feasible. Hlmc it is: — 



Should a person wish a large increase 

 of bees in preference to surplus honey, 

 allow the bees 10 cast a swarm, then hive 

 one-half of the swarm with the old queen 

 on new stand anrl return ihe other half 

 of swarm 10 parent cwlony where they 

 will keep at work uiuil a young queen 

 hatches, which will lead out a verv large 

 second swarni. H ve one-half of this in 

 another liive on new siaud with young 

 queen, and return the other half of sec- 

 ond swarm to the parent hive. Then 

 proceed to divide the ten combs on the 

 old stand into five hive?, giving two 

 frames of comb cuniaining bees, brood 

 and honev, to each; also giving to each a 

 mature queen-cell, many of which will be 

 found at this time in the hive. Now set 

 four of these on new stands, leaving the 

 parenthiveon the old stand, and give 

 each one an empty comb, if you have 

 them, or a frame with a wax starter, and 

 close them to one side with division 

 board. These y"nng queens will all 

 hatch out during the (lav or within two 

 days and be laying in ten days; then 

 give another comb or frame with wax 

 starter each week, or as fast as they in- 

 crease to cover them, till the hive is lull. 

 Thev will all build uj) to full colonies by 

 fall aiul you will have seven good stocks 

 to winter and all will have nice worker 

 combs, as these small colonies will not 

 build drone comb the first season. 



THK SUPERSEDIRE OF QUEENS. 

 Manv of us don't realize how often 

 bees supersede their (jueens. The clip- 

 ping of queens' wings has often been 

 looked upon as the cause ot their super- 

 sedvire. when it may be possible that the 

 clipping simply marks the queens so that 

 we kiiozc when they have been supersed- 

 e<l. l'p<^)n this point, Mr. Morgan says: — 



Most queens are at their best the first 

 an<l secoi;d seasons, growing less vigor- 

 ous the third, and very feeble the fourth. 

 I once considered it imporlant to super- 

 sede all cjueens afii-r the second year, but 

 after having in June, f)nc season, mark- 

 ed 25 for supersedure in September, I 



found that 19 of them hnd been superseded 

 by the bees themselves and the remaining 

 six were doing so well that I let them go 

 another year, thus proving to me their 

 ability to do such work better than their 

 keeper. 



USE AND MISUSE OF DRONE-TRAPS. 



The author of "Bee-Keeping for Prof- 

 it" does not take much stock in drone- 

 traps. He thinks it much better not to> 

 rear the drones than to rear them and 

 then catch and kill them. Here is what 

 he says: — 



There are factories where drone-traps 

 are manufactured for the purpose of 

 catching and destroying the drones, and 

 many bee journals advertise them for 

 sale and some go so far as to recommend 

 them. Why ])eople will recommend 

 such worthless traps. I cannot see. Whv 

 sliould we rear drones to trap and kill ? 

 The drone larvae costs more and takes 

 more food to carry them through the 

 larvtel state up to the day of hatching 

 than tlte food for the b dance of their life. 

 So it will be seen that the profit is not in 

 traps but in removing the drone combs 

 before the eggs are laid in them, replac- 

 ing them with worker combs, and in the 

 place where 4,000 drones are being rear- 

 ed which will take the work of 8,ouo bees 

 to feed, 6.0.0 worker bees can be reared 

 to add to the surplus. 



I believe that our Wisconsin friend 

 misjudges the use of the drone-trap. I 

 agree with him entirely in th'uking it far 

 better not to rear drones than to rear 

 them and then catch and kill them, but 

 I <loubt if many bee-keepers use drone- 

 traps simpl}- to get rid of the large num- 

 bers of drones in their hives; I think the 

 drone traps are used, in nearly all cases, 

 to prevent any drones of impure stock 

 from flying in a locality where it is de- 

 sirable to have queens mated with pure 

 drones only. In other words, the traps 

 are used to suppress every, last, undesir- 

 able drone, rather than to kill them ofT 

 on account of the honey that mtist be 

 used for their food. 



SET THE BEESOt:T EARI^V IF YOU WOULD 

 AVOID SPRING DWINDLING. 

 Sjine of us have argued that setting 

 the bees out of tl;e cellar too early, is 



