24 A YEAR'S WORK IN AN OUT-APIARY 



his own apiary: When a colony having the best breeding-queen is found 

 preparing to swarm by having queen-cells with from one to four day-old 

 larvae in them, just take the frames having these cells on them and place 

 them in an upper story over a strong colony having a queen-excluder 

 under the upper hive, and see how nicely they will complete them. When 

 the queens are ready to emerge, set one of the frames having a "ripe" 

 cell on it, together with a frame of honey, bees and all, into an empty 

 hive, and in ten or twelve days you will have a good nucleus with a fine 

 laying queen; and by treating all in the same way you can have as many 

 nuclei as you had cells. Then by giving frames of brood from other 

 colonies to take the place of those taken from the best breeder she will 

 again have more queen-cells with larva in them in a week or so, when 

 these in turn can be put on the strong colony over the excluder till the 

 cells are ripe, when more nuclei are made, and so on till we have all the 

 "iest of queens'" we need. 



The reader is undoubtedly familiar with the truth advocated of late 

 years, that, if an extracting-super is placed over a colony as soon as it 

 becomes strong in bees, swarming will be retarded to quite an extent. 

 Then on the arrival of the honey harvest, if this extracting-super is 

 taken off, and a super of sections placed on the hive, the bees will the 

 more readily enter the sections from the fact that they have been used 

 to working above the brood-nest. I practiced this quite largely eight to 

 twelve years ago, and obtained much better results than I had done 

 before. Ever since "Scientific Queen-rearing" was given to the public 

 (1889) I have been spending my best efforts in trying to work out a per- 

 fect plan of non-swarming, either with or without manipulation; and 

 during the first six or seven years, just as I would begin to think I had 

 something of value a different season would come, the bees swarm, and 

 spoil it all. I was about to give up in despair, when one day it came to 

 me, "why not use this extracted super plan, combined with shook swarm- 

 ing?" which was then first appearing in sight. My mental reply was, 

 "I do not want any plan that will not put the first-gathered honey (more 

 than is needed for brood-rearing) anywhere else than in the sections." 

 Then the thought came, "Is it not possible to have the first honey, which 

 others extract, stored In the upper story of a full-sized hive, thereby re- 

 tarding swarming still more, and then work in such a way as to cause 

 the bees to put it in sections later on?" With this, despair turned to 

 hope, and this hope has become a reality by the perfect working of the 

 plan as now given to the public; and the result of the year 1905 (114% 

 lbs. of section honey on an average per colony), the poorest of all late 

 years for honey in this locality, has caused me to write the matter up, 

 so all who wish can use it. 



Having the 13 colonies "swarmed," and the six others on the road 

 to prosperity after a careful looking-over the whole, to see that "all is 

 well," the scythe is again wrapped up, allowed a whole seat in the 

 ambulance (auto), the starting-crank turned, when I am soon experienc- 

 ing a delightful rest in the "noonday" sun (which had seemed pretty hot 

 in my work in the bee-yard), made so comfortable through the pleasant 



