42 



ADVANCED BEE-CULTURE. 



basket to a shady place and cover with 

 a cloth. Then remove the next ba.sket 

 that secures the proper quota, and so on 

 to the end. Or the bees may be allowed 

 to cluster about a single queen in a sin- 

 gle basket, and then the cluster divided 

 up, and each division furnished a queen. 



And now I am going to give something 

 that, in actual practice, by a large num- 

 ber of bee-keepers, may not turn out so 

 well as represented. 



Every bee-keeper knows of the dispo- 

 sition of bees 1o crawl upwards. To in- 

 duce a queen to leave a cage, turn the 

 opening up. Those who have watched 

 the motions of a clipped queen in front 

 of the hive from which a swarm has just 

 issued, have probably noticed her dis- 

 position to crawl up a spear of grass or 

 anything of this nature that she can find. 

 At a recent meeting of the Huron, Tus- 

 cola and Sanilac Co. bee-keepers, a Mr. 

 West told how it was possible to take ad- 

 vantage of this climbing disposition on 

 the part of the queen, to induce a swarm 

 with a clipped queen to cluster and re- 

 main upon a stake in front of the hive 

 from which it had issued. 



This discovery was the result of an 

 accident, or rather of a lucky "happen 

 so." In front of one of his hives a mul- 

 lein had been allowed to form a stalk. 

 Coming home one day he found a swarm 

 from this hive clustered upon the mul- 

 lein stalk. He at once reasoned that the 

 queen, as she alighted in front of the 

 hive, found and climbed the mullein stalk, 

 and the swarm, upon its return, foundand 

 clustered about her. Taking a hint from 

 this he cleared away all rubbish from in 

 front of all the hives, and a few inches in 

 front of each hive he thrust into the 

 ground a branch of an apple tree. He used 

 branches perhaps an inch in diameter 

 and two feet long with a few short twigs 

 at the top. The twigs were cut off to a 

 length of four or six inches. The branch 

 was not planted in an upright position, 

 but leaning away from the mouth of the 

 hive. Then it was not in the way of the 

 workers as they passed out and in the 



hive, while a swarm clustered at the top 

 would be held so far from the entrance 

 of the hive that there would be no danger 

 of its being enticed back into the hive. 



This plan proved a perfect success. 

 He had practiced it for three years, and 

 one year had as many as sixty swarms, 

 and it had never failed. It seemed to me 

 that the queen might not always find the 

 tree to climb, but would crawl off in some 

 other direction, but he said not; that the 

 stake was planted just about where she 

 would naturally strike the ground when 

 leaving the hive, and she invariably 

 found and climbed the pole, and that 

 the bees clustered about her and remain- 

 ed. As the queen could not take wing 

 and the bees would not desert her, it nat- 

 urally followed that they would remain 

 until removed by the bee-keeper. 



Sometimes a good thing is brought out, 

 illustrated and described, yet it falls 

 dead — does not "take." The T super 

 had a hard struggle before its merit was 

 recognized. "Bee escapes," are another 

 illustration of this truth. I well remem- 

 ber how my brother and I laughed, and 

 rolled over in the grass, when I read a 

 letter from some one who had planned a 

 bee escape. "If we can produce the hon- 

 ey, I guess we can get the bees off from 

 it," was the comment we made. It was 

 really two or three years before I could 

 bring myself to regard the bee-escape 

 seriously. I think that what is called a 

 "swarm catcher" must be placed in the 

 same category. It was first brought out 

 by a Mr. W. J. Bailey of Wisconsin. I 

 well remember how some of us pooh, 

 poohed at it. "Who would think of 

 bringing such machinery as that into the 

 yard, and then stand arcund and wait 

 for a swairm to issue so that we can fit 

 this rigging over the hive?" That is the 

 way we talked. Later, the late, lament- 

 ed B. Taylor of Minnesota took up the 

 idea and made a great success of it. 

 When I was up to Minnesota last winter, 

 attening their State convention, I found 

 several practical bee-keepers were using 

 the swarm catcher, yet, strange to say, it 



