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NINTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



moved a colony of bees fifteen miles 

 and given them a good shaking up 

 that we noticed they were depleted 

 in numbers; it seems to me the col- 

 ony is not as populous as it ought to 

 be. I have often thought that worry- 

 ing in there they have shortened their 

 lives; that it was not really Deneficial 

 to the colonies. I would like to have 

 some statements from others who 

 have had more experience. 



Mr. Morgan^ — For the last 35 years 

 I have nnoved bees more or less, es- 

 pecially in "Wisconsin. I make a prac- 

 tice of moving bees every season to 

 the out yard, and, to make a long 

 story short, I believe the moving of 

 the bees is a good thing for the in- 

 crease of honey and the helping of en- 

 ergizing them for the work that has 

 been referred to. I found no unfav- 

 orable symptoms coming from that, 

 and if that would be considered a 

 shaking of the bees, I would agree 

 with the paper that has been read in 

 regard to shaking. Moving bees, oth- 

 er things being equal, I think is a 

 benefit. 



Mr. Anderson — Last year I looked 

 around and I saw one stand with very 

 few bees in it, and they were coming 

 out from one side. I looked at them 

 a while and I thought, what can be 

 the matter? I made up my mind I 

 would see by experiment. I opened 

 the top and took out the frames. I 

 wasn't afraid of destroying them be- 

 cause they were pretty well destroyed 

 before — and afterwards I found that 

 colony did better than any of the oth- 

 ers and gave more honey. 



Mr. Barber — Last June I moved two 

 apiaries of bees. One apiary, while 

 it did not have the same location, had 

 the same treatment. One apiary I 

 fixed up and put on the upper stories 

 myself. I am getting old, and I said, I 

 will do this just as easy as I can. I 

 hardly had a smoker or anything of 

 that kind. The next apiary I did not 

 put on the upper stories, but I went 

 down and got 70 or 75 in the shed, 

 and I said to my man, I am in a fix, 

 can't you 'put those other stories on 

 for me? He said. Yes, I can. He 

 went down, and he was quite a little 

 bit afraid of them, and I said to him, 

 You get down into the bottom and 

 get out a frame or two and put them 

 up above. He went down and took 

 out some frames and put them up. 

 The conseouence was that when I 



went to this hive that I had been so 

 careful about I couldn't find any honey. 

 I said, that set of colonies hasn't got 

 enough honey to winter them. In the 

 other apiary there were a good many 

 of the colonies which had sixty pounds. 

 I have another apiary, and after I had 

 hired a couple of men to put those 

 upper stories on, there were forty-six 

 swarms there, and they got off fifteen 

 sixty pound- cans of honey frona them, 

 and there was quite a good deal of it 

 was not capped over. Those two 

 apiaries that got the most smoking 

 gave the most honey. 



Mr. Clark — Mr. Vice-President, I 

 probably have not had as large an ex- 

 perience aS' some of the gentlemen 

 who have spoken on the subject, but I 

 have had a little practice, and there 

 is one thing I found out in shaking 

 bees after I had done it the second 

 season, I found that it wasn't neces- 

 sary. The trouble with bees I think 

 is something different from shaking. 

 I have found out that if you shake 

 some bees they are of no use. My 

 firm belief is that if a man has the 

 right strain of bees and gives them 

 enovrgh room, they do not need any 

 shaking. If they are anything like the 

 bees that are in my yard, he has got 

 to be very careful. I live four miles 

 from LeMars, and I drive out every 

 night and morning. On the 28th of 

 last June coming home one evening 

 I saw a very large swarm hanging on 

 a willow hedge. I stopped and took 

 the swarm with me and hived it into 

 an eight frame hive on drawn combs. ' 

 That was about seven days before the 

 white clover honey flow opened up. I 

 put those bees into the apiary along 

 with the rest of my bees, and during 

 all the honey flows there were — we 

 had several short honey flows — those 

 ibees would never go to work in the 

 super; and furthermore, they never 

 got enough honey in the lower part to 

 winter on. On the last day of July 

 I went in there and examined these 

 hives, and they were quite full of bees 

 — a nice lot of bees there. I examined 

 the queen, and I pinched the queen's 

 head off. After that, in about 42 days, 

 they had filled two supers of honey. 

 If there is anything in the strain of 

 bees, or if there is more in the shak- 

 ing, I would like to hear some other 

 gentlemen get up here and tell me it 

 is the shaking that does it, because I 

 am not convinced of that. The only 



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