INVESTIGATIONS PERTAINING TO TEXAS BEEKEEPING. v4 
June 3.—More rain. Flow very heavy. 
June 15.—Horsemint still in full bloom but honey-flow slackening on 
account of no rain. 
June 1?%.—Good rain, with cool norther. 
June 19.—Honey-flow improved slightly. 
June 20.—First honey extracted from supers. 
June 24.—Horsemint flow failing. 
July 4—Horsemint flow entirely over; seeds ripe. 
Ror 12.—All horsemint dead. Cotton honey beginning to come in 
slowly. 
July 20.—Very hot and dry. No honey-flow at all. 
August 8.—Still no rain. Amount of honey from cotton hardly suf- 
ficient to be perceptible in supers. : 
September 16.—First light shower since June 17th. 
September !7.—Bees getting a little dark honey, source unknown. 
September 19.—Weather has been very hot to the present time. First 
fall in temperature today—60° night temperature. 
October 15.—A little honey has been coming in from broomweed and 
cotton since September 17th, but of little importance. Weather cooler. 
Reduced entrances of weakest colonies. 
October 16-17.—First autumn rain of importance. 
October. 18.—First norther, temperature 58°. 
October 20-November 25.—Light flow from cotton and broomweed con- 
tinued. A small amount of honey placed in the supers, but averaging 
less than 10 pounds per colony. 
November 27%.—First frost.” 
SWARM-CONTROL EXPERIMENTS. 
The term “swarm-control” should not, in this instance, be construed 
too literally, for the experiments under this head had as their object the 
prevention, anticipation or delay of swarming in order that natural 
swarms would not be lost in the out-apiary where the colonies were 
located. The methods used for this purpose may be grouped as follows: 
1. Artificial division of colonies. - 
2. Increasing size of brood chamber: 
(a) Before queen-cells were started. 
(b) After queen-cells were started. 
8. Increasing super-space, but without increasing size of brood- 
chamber. 
4. Shaking colonies onto foundation. 
1. Artificial Division. 
The question is often asked: “Which is the most profitable, to prevent 
a colony from swarming and thus conserve its strength, or to divide it 
into two colonies early in the season and have both of them gather 
honey?” ‘The question is an interesting one as well as an important one 
and, from conversations which the writer has had with various bee- 
keepers, the consensus of opinion seems to be that the one colony, if 
increase is prevented, will give the most profitable returns. It must be 
conceded that various factors have a bearing on this question, and this 
