338 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



that, to secure the proper reward for 

 their labors, they must keep more bees 

 —an apiary for each day in the week. 

 Now a new factor (really old but new- 

 ly brought to public attention) has 

 been discovered that, if given suffic- 

 ient attention, will solve both prob- 

 lems—yes, and the additional one of 

 swarming. I have reference to shook 

 swarms. It is really surprising the 

 extent to which shook swarming has 

 been practiced, and the general bee- 

 keeper knew not of it. A perusal of 

 Gleanings for October 15 shows this. 

 That issue of Gleanings is really a 

 symposium on that subject. More than 

 a dozen bee-keepers, many of them 

 old stagers, well known and responsi- 

 ble apiarists, report at length their 

 methods and success in managing an 

 apiary on the shook principle. I copy 

 some of them into this issue, and may 

 copy more in future issues. 



Just stop and think, my friends of 

 the tremendous effect that the success 

 and adoption of shook swarming 

 means to bee-keeping. It is the equal 

 of the honey extractor, or comb foun- 

 dation, or the section honey box. Just 

 notice what it will accomplish. 



How many, many, many times have 

 we said: "Oh, if the bees only would- 

 n't swarm. If only we could plant an 

 apiary over here, and another over 

 there, and so on until we have six or 

 seven of them, and be able to visit 

 them once a week or such a matter. 

 If only we could prevent swarming, 

 what wonderful things we could do." 

 In the extension of bee-keeping in the 

 establishment of out apiaries, swarm- 

 ing has been the one insurmountable 

 difficulty. Men have racked their 

 brains over non-swarmers and self- 

 hivers, but practical success came not. 

 To keep a man in each yard to hive 

 the swarms is too expensive. Large 

 hives and the free use of the honey 

 extractor came the nearest to solving 

 the problem, but the attempt to pro- 



duce comb honey in an out apiary 

 brought the bee-keeper face to face 

 with the swarming problem. There 

 were many makeshifts and partial 

 successes, but complete success was 

 still in the future. This question is 

 now solved. One man, possibly, with 

 the aid of one helper, can manage 600 

 or 700 colonies of bees, placed in apiar- 

 ies of 100 colonies each. Do you real- 

 ize what that means? Instead of hav- 

 ing an income from luO colonies, you 

 can have it from six times that many. 

 As I think of it, how it makes my 

 blood tingle to go out and start those 

 apiaries. 



Perhaps the next important advant- 

 age of this method is the impunity 

 that it gives one from foul brood. 

 When a apiary is free from foul brood, 

 it remains free unless the infection is 

 brought into the yard in some man- 

 ner, and, when it is brought in from 

 neighboring apiaries, it is almost in- 

 variably brought in by the bees rob- 

 bing or bringing home infected honey 

 from some diseased apiary that is 

 near. Now then, bees wont's rob when 

 they are getting plenty of nectar from 

 the blossoms. Wait until the honey 

 flows open and the bees are storing 

 honey anu ready to swarm, and then 

 shake every colony that has shown 

 any sign of the disease. Some bee- 

 keepers out in Colorado have shaken 

 every colony, made a clean sweep of 

 it. If an apiary is thus freed from 

 foul blood, it remains free so long as 

 the honey harvest lasts. If the seeds 

 are brought in by robbers after the 

 harvest is over, it will be too late for 

 it to do much damage before brood 

 rearing will be over. The next spring 

 the bees can be shook again. When 

 the combs are freed from brood, the 

 honey can be extracted and sold to 

 some factory that uses it in baking 

 cakes. This will put the honey be- 

 yond any power of doing harm, and 

 the combs can be rendered into wax. 



