THOUSAND ANSWERS 
113 
Q. How long is it from an egg to a bee? I mean how long 
after the egg is laid till it is a full-grown bee? 
A. For a queen, IS or 16 days; for a worker, 21 days; for a 
drone, 24 days. 
Heartsease. — Q. My bees have done well in this part of South- 
ern Kansas this season. There is no trouble in wintering here, 
as they have a flight nearly every week. I expect to move to 
south-central Iowa this fall. Will my bees winter successfully 
there on heartsease honey, or would it be better to extract the 
honey from the brood-nest and feed sugar syrup? In 1905, some 
of my bees died of dysentery wintering on heartsease honey and 
not being able to take a flight for about six weeks on account of 
the severe weather. 
A. It is possible that heartsease honey was not to blame for 
the trouble of 1905. Surely thousands of colonies have wintered 
on it, and it has not had the name of being bad for winter food. 
My bees wintered well last winter, and I think a good share of 
their honey was heartsease. 
Hive-Stand. — Q. Which is better, a hive-stand a couple of feet 
high, or one a few inches high, with the entrance-board slanting, 
so that in case the clipped queen went out to swarm she could 
crawl back in the hive again and thus not be lost? 
A. For you it may be better to have the hive quite low. Where 
certain kinds of ants are bad (generally in the south), it is well 
to have the hive on legs so that by means of dishes of oil or water 
the ants may be prevented from getting into hives. 
Hives. — Q. I would like to know if there is a book on making 
hives ? 
A. I know of no such book. 
Q. I am not a young man in years, but am young in the 
knowledge of bees. I keep bees only for the honey I can get. 
What use is there for me to use patent hives when I know noth- 
ing about them? Why is not my old-fashioned gum with a good, 
big, plain box-cap just as good for getting the same amount of 
honey in a season as the patent hives? 
A. Let me say, first, that most of the hives in use now by 
practical beekeepers have no patent on them, the patent on the 
Langstroth movable frame having expired many years ago. So 
your question probably is: What advantage is there for you in 
movable-frame hives over common box-hives? Perhaps there is 
no advantage. It depends upon circumstances. The movable- 
frame hive is no better for the bees than a box-hive; in general 
not so good. It has really only one advantage over a box-hive, 
