ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION 



157 



ling some bees, when I used to fool with 

 them, and had a lot of them shaken on 

 the ground, and in stumbling around 

 with my big feet I must have hurt the 

 queen. I noticed before I got through 

 the colony that the bees were in a tur- 

 moil. They were running up on the 

 front of the hive, and on the side, and 

 looking around as lively as possible. I 

 concluded something had happened to 

 the queen. I looked on the ground and 

 found I had stepped on her. I got an- 

 other queen and they were perfectly 

 satisfied with the other queen. 



Mr. Abbott — I have been trying for 

 20 years to get into current bee-litera- 

 ture and bee-books this one statement, 

 that it is not necessary for any colony 

 to be made queenless in order to intro- 

 duce a queen safely a day, or an hour, 

 or a minute, except what time is neces- 

 sary between pinching the queen's head 

 off and turning the other queen out, 

 or putting her in a condition to get out. 

 After 20 years' trial I do not think 

 that that statement is in a bee-book, or 

 in any bee-literature that has not come 

 directly from my mouth in reporting 

 something that I have said in a conven- 

 tion about it. 



Dr. Miller — Allow me to speak and 

 say right here that Mr. Abbott perhaps 

 never reads anything I write, or he 

 would not say that sort of thing. 



Mr. Abbott — I beg your pardon, then. 

 It is not in any book. 



Dr. Miller — It is in the American 

 Bee Journal. 



Mr. Abbott — I have said it in the 

 American Bee Journal several times, 

 commenced about 25 years ago, and I 

 have been saying it ever since. I want 

 to say again, for the benefit of those 

 who have not heard me say the same 

 thing, that I never make a colony 

 queenless. I do not rear queens any 

 more, but on every cage I find direc- 

 tions, and those directions I invariabh'^ 

 tear off because they say to make the 

 colony queenless 48 hours, and then in- 

 troduce the queen. 



Dr. Bohrer — Do you simply remove 

 the queen, destroy her, and turn the 

 other one loose? 



Mr. Abbott — No, sir. When I have 

 a queen or a half a dozen queens that 

 I want to keep, I put them on top of 

 the frames of a colony and leave them 

 there 2 or 3 days. If I want to intro- 

 duce one of those queens I hunt out 

 the old queen, pinch her head off and 



turn one of the others free. If I wanted 

 the old queen free in the hive day after 

 to-morrow, having introduced one to- 

 day, I would take that old queen out, 

 put her into a cage and turn another 

 one free, and in a very little while the 

 queen in the cage is out on the combs 

 laying, and the bees never know they 

 have been queenless. They have no 

 feeling of resentment towards those 

 queens in the cage any more than they 

 have the one free on the combs. They 

 are just as friendly with any one of the 

 5 queens on top of the frames as the 

 one in the hive laying eggs, and they 

 take one just as well as another. What 

 is the use of killing the queen and 

 having them start queen-cells, which 

 they will in 48 hours, and take the 

 chances of their killing the queens? 

 When they start cells they are antago- 

 nistic to any queen, even their own 

 queen. 



Dr. Miller — How long after you put 

 that queen in before the bees liberate 

 her? 



Mr. Abbott — I fix it so that she will 

 be out in an hour — not to exceed an 

 hour. 



Mr. Whitney — I purchase a consid- 

 erable number of queens usually, and 

 I have been anxious to find the best 

 way of introducing queens, having tried 

 various methods. I heard Mr. Abbott 

 give his method of introducing queens 

 here, a couple of years ago, I think, and 

 thought I would try it. I sometimes 

 get a half-dozen queens in rainy weath- 

 er. Perhaps there will be 2 or 3 days 

 of bad weather; I can't introduce them. 

 I know what colonies I wish to intro- 

 duce those queens to, and I distribute 

 them around over the frames and leave 

 them there till the weather clears up so 

 that I can introduce them, and then I 

 remove the old queens and let young 

 queens free immediately. I have never 

 lost a queen, when introducing them in 

 that way. Of course, I would do the 

 same thing if the weather were not 

 bad, but it is a convenience if the 

 weather is bad, to lake this plan of 

 doing it, and it never fails under any 

 circumstances with me. Always place 

 the queens over the frames of the col- 

 ony in which you wish to introduce 

 them, without removing the little paste- 

 board or cork, and when you get ready 

 to introduce them, remove the old queen 

 from the hive and let the queen free 

 immediately; and, as Mr. Abbott has 



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