THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW, 



93" 



tinue those advance leaders. If bee-keepers 

 were a set of uiiinies and could only repeat 

 parrot-like whatever some one else might 

 say, then the leader business would not do. 

 No one would dare to disagree with you, and 

 there would be no independent expression of 

 opinion. But your correspondents seem to 

 have opinions of their own which they do 

 not hesitate to express. If they differ from 

 you, they say so ; if they have additional 

 light, they give it. 



Let's see, how would it be, supposing you 

 should cover the whole ground correctly. 

 Then some fifteen correspondents, one after 

 another, say " I agree." Isn't that better 

 than for the reader to have to wade through 

 fifteen different articles to get the same 

 ideas. In other words, isn't it better to have 

 the thing boiled down ? After all, when you 

 have gone over the whole ground never so 

 carefully, there still seems to be enough left 

 for the correspondents to say to fill up each 

 number. How would it be if each one, in 

 addition, should go over the whole ground 

 covered by the leader ? No, whatever you 

 do, don't give up writing a leader each time 

 which you try to make exhaustive. 



Long life to the Review and the reviewer. 



Mabengo, 111. March l(j, 1891. 



Queens Injured by Hot Smoke — Getting Two 



Queens in a Hive — The Peet Principle 



Enlarged Upon. 



J. A. gkeen. 



|HE use of smoke to compel a ball of 

 bees to release the imprisoned queen 

 is not advisable. I have known queens 

 to become so stupefied by a heavy volume of 

 hot, damp smoke poured upon them at the 

 nozzle of the smoker, that they never re- 

 covered from it. Likewise I have seen 

 queens so scorched by a single hot blast 

 from a smoker full of live coals that they 

 died from the effects of it. 



You say you believe there are times when 

 a colony with a laying queen will accept an- 

 other laying queen simply by having her 

 placed upon the combs. Last summer I 

 introduced a queen by caging into a colony 

 where I supposed a virgin queen had been 

 lost. Two days later she was released by my 

 assistant, who remarked several hours after- 

 ward that there were eggs in that hive. On 

 examination I found both queens going 

 tranquilly about their business of egg lay- 

 ing. 



The principle of the Peet cage is a very 

 good one, but in practice it is a very poor 

 cage for introducing, and I think many 

 queens have been lost by relying on it. A 

 much better introducing cage is made by 

 taking a piece of wire cloth four or five 

 inches square, having the edges turned up 

 all around about seven squares from the 

 edge. Ravel out one wire all around the 

 edge. Put the cage on a square piece of tin 

 having two adjoining edges slightly turned 

 up. Out of the corner opposite the turned 

 up edges cut a piece about ^^ in. square. 

 Slide one corner of the cage out over this 

 opening and bees and queens are readily 

 put in. Usually it is best not to put any bees 

 with the queen, especially if they have come 

 from a distance. Select a place where there 

 are both hatching brood and honey, lay the 

 cage on it, remove the tin slide and press the 

 wire cloth slightly into the surface of the 

 comb. If this is carefully done the bees 

 will seldom dig under the cage too soon. 

 Last summer a queen that had been over- 

 looked remained thirty-one days in such a 

 cage before I found and released her. If 

 desired, the cage may be made large enough 

 to cover the whole side of a comb, thus put- 

 ting the queen in the most favorable condi- 

 tions. The plan of introducing by having 

 the bees eat out a plug of candy, I have used 

 mostly in introducing virgin queens. I have 

 had a number of failures, which is probably 

 no fault of the method. Doolittle's plan of 

 introducing has been much used by me in 

 introducing virgin queens, and I think I 

 have never had a failure with it. 



Dayton, 111. March 27, 1891. 



Protectors for Single-Wallea Hives. 



A. G. HILL. 



"^ TRAVELLED in Northern Indiana 

 5w/ about seven seasons, selling bee-keepers' 

 supplies, and during this time there oc- 

 curred two or three unusually heavy losses 

 of bees during the winter. Whenever I came 

 across colonies of bees successfully wintered 

 I availed myself of the privilege of making 

 the closest examinations in regard to how 

 such exceptions come about, as indeed some 

 springs the live colonies were so few that 

 they could be called by no other name. I 

 found the hives protected in all manner of 

 ways, and some colonies alive that had no 

 protection at all. I am not expected to give 

 a detailed account of all I saw, but rather 



