BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
A. If the one colony is quite weak, or if you are not anxious to save the queen, then you had better unite in the fall, since there is much danger that a weak colony will not winter through.
Q. What kind of perfume is sprinkled over bees when uniting two colonies to make them of the same odor?
A. I think peppermint has been used, and anise, cloves, or any other perfume might serve the same purpose.
Q. How will it do to use a fine spray of water to unite bees?
Q. I don't believe it would do very well, but don't know.
the newspaper, "or do you use an empty hive-body so the bees will go down quickly?
A. It doesn't matter whether empty combs are left in the upper story or not. The bees will unite just as quickly with or without them. Of course, after the bees have had time to unite, the two stories are reduced to one, the best combs of the two stories being selected till one story.
Q. I have just read about your way of uniting two colonies by putting paper between them. Did you ever try putting a queen-excluding honey-board between them?
.A. Yes, I have united with an excluder between the two colonies. It is much the same as having nothing between the two stories. In some cases--perhaps in most cases--bees will unite paccably when one hive is set directly over the other, with no excluder between. In some cases, of course, they would unite all right with an excluder. But too often it happens that if one hive is set never the other without any precaution, there will be a severe fight. In that case I doubt if the excluder would do any good. But the paper will. There is no possibility, with the paper, that one set of bees can fall upon the others en masse. It will take a bit of time for a hole to be made in the paper that shall
Figure 3: Two colonies united by the newspaper plan.
let a bee through, and for some time there will be passage for only one bee at a time. In the meantime the two lots of bees are getting the same scent, ready to unite peaceably. At any rate, I've had one lot of bees killed when there was no paper between, and I'm not sure I ever had fighting when the paper was used.
Q. I have 50 colonies of bees in dovetailed hives, and want to keep but 35, spring count. How and when can I double them up? what should I do to keep the frames of larvae and honey? And how may I keep the frames of comb during the winter?
A. Better wait till next spring to unite. If you unite this fall, there may be some casualties in winter, and you would not then have your 25 in spring. Even if you are sure of no winter losses in your mild climate, there are advantages in waiting till spring. There will be no question about care of combs through the winter, and by doubling 50 full colonies in the spring you are likely to have 25 stronger colonies than if the doubling were done in the fall; and 25 very strong colonies will take no more care than 35 weaker ones. and will store more surplus.
**Uniting Swarms.-Q.** Is it better to unite two swarms and make one big swarm out of two? And will I get more honey from one big swarm than I would get from two small ones?
A. You will be more likely to get more honey from uniting. In places where a strong flow continues very late, more honey may be had from the two kept separate.
Q. I would like to know the best way to double swarms up. If they both come out the same day, or a day or two apart, should I put the old colony on top of the new swarm? Should I take the bottom out of the top hive, or how can I get them together?
A. If they are only a day or two apart, the easiest way is to hive the second one in the same hive as the first, just as if the hive were empty.
Q. When hiving two swarms should I sprinkle or smoke them to make them go in the entrance?
A. If you dump them at the entrance they will enter of their own accord, without smoke or sprinkling.
Q. What is the best way to unite a swarm direct from the tree with a weak colony? I have just shaken it in front of the hive, but many of the bees were killed at the entrance of the hive.
A. Perhaps if you had shaken the bees off the combs at the entrance, so that the two lots of bees would run in together, there would have been less trouble. If one lot has an old queen and the other a virgin, they'do not unite so well.
**Value of Bees.--Q**. How much is a colony of Italian bees in a modern hivc worth, including super, sections, etc., in the spring, summer or fall?
A. There is no hard and fast rule about this, although the variation may not be so great as with box-hives. It may be from $ to $10 in the spring, and $2 or $3 less in the fall.
Q. (a) What could I afford to pay for a swarm of bees hanging where they clustered, if it was the first that issued from the hive?
(b) What would a good, strong colony be worth if it was in an old box-gum? How much if it was in a movable 8-frame hive?
A. (a) So much depends. One swarm may have two ar three times as many bees as another, even when both are primes swarms. In some places you might get a swarm for a dollar from someone who got little from bees and in another place an experienced beekeeper might not be willing to sell such a swarm for five times as much.
(b) Again there would be a great variation. A colony in a movable-frame hive might be worth in some places $7 or more, in other places $5 or less.
**Ventilation.--Q**. What is the best way to ventiate the hive?
A. It doesn't matter so much just how you ventiate, so you give ventilation enough. One way is to raise the hive by putting a block under each one of the four corners. I generally ventiate 1\({}_{3}\) having a very large entrance and an opening at the back end of the hive on top letting the super come far enough forward to make the opening.
Q. Does a hive need ventilation if in the shade? If so, would it need it when the temperature gets up to 90 degrees in the shade? How low can the temperature get before it needs shutting down?
A. Yes; I once had combs melt down in a hive so thoroughly shaded that the sun did not shine on it all day long; but there was a thicket on one side and a cornfield on the other, so that there was little chance for the air to stir..A colony must have ventilation to some extent always. At any time when the bees are hivey gathering there should be sufficient ventilation so the bees will not hang out. An entrance equivalent to nine square inches is as little as should be allowed, and if that cannot be had otherwise, the hive should be blocked up. But 20 square inches of ventilating space is better than nine. There is no need to makeany change when the temperature runs up to 90 degrees, nor when it runs down on cold nights.
Q. Do you use ventilation under supers, or open at the top through the summer?
A. Generally, with section-sopers, I have ventilation at the back end, between the hive and lower super, and sometimes in the cover of the hive as well. In a cool time, however, it is better to have the ventilation closed, for sections at that part are not finished so soon.
Q. In your text-book you give a plan of ventilating the upper stories by shoving them forward and back, leaving a_space at one end. Does the rain not get in through the space?
A. I suppose it does, but it never seems to do any harm, being at the end. At any rate, the harm is overbalanced by the good.
Q. How is the best way to ventiate hives in winter?
A. In the cellar it matters little how, provided there be enough ventilation and there is no danger of having too much. Formerly, with box-hives, a good plan was to turn the hive upside down, with no covering over it. That left it all open above and all closed below. Of course, no sort of hive ventilation will avail if the air in the cellar is impure. For outdoor wintering, the entrance may be three-eighths by six inches for a strong colony, and less for a weak one; besides this opening at the entrance, some cover with some sort of packing that allows a little air slowly to pass upward. Others leave the cover sealed down as the bees left it in summer and fall. But in this case the top must be warmly covered.
Q. What do you think of ventilation at the top of a hive in winter? Is it important, and, if so, would it not be proper to cut a 2-inch hole through a quilt and place the cloth cushions filled with cork chips on top of this? I use table oilcloth for quilts in summer and winter. Is there anything better?
A. There is a decided difference of opinion as to the matter of upward ventilation in winter, some reporting success with sealed covering, others reporting disaster. In either case it is important to have warm covering overhead for outdoor wintering. You are on the safe side not to have all sealed tight, and the plan you propose may work all right. I used oilcloth, same as you, for years, but for many years past have had no covering over brood-frames except the hive cover, and this method I like better. But it must be remembered that I winter in the cellar.
**Vinegar,--Q**. I am told that good vinegar can be made from honey or cappings. Will you give how much honey or cappings to each gallon of water and how to proceed to make it?
A. Use one to one and one-half pounds of honey to each gallon of water. Dissolve the honey and place in a barrel with the bung removed, so as to give as much air as possible. The warmer the place it is stored the better, as this will hasten fermentation. If you use capping washings for making vinegar, a good way to test if the water is sweet enough is by the use of an egg. If the egg comes to the surface of the liquid, then it is about right. To hasten fermentation, you may also add a little vinegar mother, if you have it, to your sweetened water. Full instructions may be found in most bebebooks.
When you test honey water with an egg the egg should show only the size of a dime out of the water.
**Waste Places.--Q**. Does anyone know of something that could be sown in waste places where irrigating water runs, or where Bermuda grass now grows that would produce honey and also be good for the farmer? There are several places here where Bermuda grass grows, when it gets the waste water from the ranches.
A. Sweet clover has been very successful in such cases.
**Water for Bees.--Q**. What do the bees do with the water they get in the mud-holes?
A. The same as they do with water from any other source; they use it for drink and to thin their honey, for feeding the brood.
Q. We have an apiary where an irrigating ditch runs right along in front of the hives, but the bees go over to our neighbor's, about 80 rods away and get water from their watering trough, and they annoy them very much, as the stock can hardly get any water to drink on account of the bees. What could we do to help out our neighbor?
A. When the bees have formed the habit of going to a certain place for water, it is a very hard thing to get them to change to some other place. If the trough is not too large, it may be covered up by boards, sheets, or otherwise, opening it only at certain times in the day to let the stock drink. After a few days the bees will give it up. Possibly you may be able to make the place offensive for bees while still all right for the four-footers. Put carbonic acid or kerosene on the edges of the trough where the bees stand to get the water. Of course there is the danger that in doing this you will get some of the stuff in the water, so the stockwill not drink it. As in so many other things, prevention is better than cure. In the spring, when bees first begin to get water, do all you can to prevent their getting a start in the wrong place, and to start them in the right place. In a sheltered place where the sun will keep it warm, put a tub or nail of water, throw over i: some cork chips, such as grocers get as packing in kegs of grapes, and you will have a watering place where no bees will drown, and all you will need to do will be to fill np occasionally with water. Once started there, they will be likely to continue. One would be likely to think the bees would prefer the nearby irrigating ditch to the water trough farther away. But bees do not object to a considerable distance, and it is possible that the trough gives better footing for the bees, and that the water in it is warmer than in the ditch.
**Water for Bees-Cork Chips.-Q.** What size of cork chips do you use in water to keep bees from getting drowned? Also, about how thick is the layer of corks on top of the water? I am trying to get cork chips here. I can get gramulated cork, of which I have samples, Nos. 2, 3 and 4. Watering bees in this locality is quite an item. My 75 colonies get away with as high as 60 gallons per day. I have to haul it all. I have been using a large trough filled with brickbats, but the brickbats take up almost all of the space. I also tried second-hand corks (cut them up), but in a few days the water would be foul; mostly wine corks. I am sending samples of cork chips. Should they be finer, or coarser, etc? (California.)
A. I don't believe it makes so very much difference as to the size of the cork chips, although I suppose the finest chips will lose their buoyancy soonest. Neither does it matter greatly as to the depth of the layer, only so it be not so thin that the bees will sink down into the water, nor so thick that they cannot reach the water. The chips I have been using are those which the grocers receive as packing in kegs of grapes that come in winter, or at least very late in the fall. The chips are of various diameters, from very fine ones, up to those that are one-eighth inch or more in diameter. A layer about three-quarters inch deep is first used, and more added later as they become soaked. The idea i: to have enough chips so that the top surface will be a little out of the water. Although I never tried that size, I suspect that the ccarsest you send. (something like one-quarter inch in diameter) would be ideal.
**Water, Bees Near.-Q.** (a) Would bees be likely to do well near a large body of water, or would they be likely to fall into the lake?(b) On which side of a lake would you prefer to keep--east or west side?
A. (a) The water is not likely to do any harm, only it is just so much surface without any pasturage, just like so much barren land. If the body of water was so narrow that the bees would cross it to get pasturage on the other side, a few bees might beaten down in crossing by high winds.
(b) The side that had the best pasturage.
**Wax (See Beeswax.)**
**Wax-Extractor.--Q.** How can I make a solar wax-extractor without much expense? Does the solar wax-extractor take out all the wax, especially out of old combs?
A. Any kind of a shallow box, and of any size, covered with glass, so placed that the rays of the sun shall shine directly into it, will become hot enough on the inside to melt wax. A single pane of glass will do if large enough, or a common window-sash may be used. To hold the pieces of comb to be melted, have a plain sheet of tin, slanting I to 3 inches (according to the size of the box) from rear to front, so that the melted wax will run down into a vessel that you will place under to catch the wax. You may use a sheet of wire-cloth, so the wax will run through. This will work very nicely with cappings and burr-combs, but a good deal of wax will be left in old brood-combs. Especially will this be so if one brood-comb lies over another.
**Weak Colonies.--Q.** Would it be all right to put a new swarm in with a weak colony and thus make a strong one out of it?
A. Yes; but in thus uniting, the two queens should both be laying queens, or both virgin queens. If one has a laying queen and the other a virgin, they are likely to fight.
Q. I have two colonies of bees which f hived last May. One of them produced about 50 pounds of surplus honey, while the other produced only 5 pounds. What was the matter with the second one? Was it an unprolific queen, or not?
A. It may be that there was a difference in the strength of the two swarms at the time they were hived, and it must be remembered that a colony twice as strong as another will store a good deal more than twice as much surplus. The difference may have been in the character of the bees. Some bees are more industrious than others. There may have been other causes or a combination of causes.
walls is generally used; say two or three inches. But doubling the space between walls will by no means double the protection.
Q. I am planning to build winter-cases 24x36 inches, each to hold two colonies. I also intend to leave the cases around the hives in the summer, as a protection from heat. Will the bees become confused and enter the wrong hive, or will queens returning from their mating trip be liable to enter the wrong hive?
A. I suppose your idea is that bees or queens may be confused by having the two entrances in what seems to them the same building. I don't think there will be any trouble in that way. I have used double hives with entrances not six inches apart, and I don't think there was any more trouble than with separate hives.
Winter Packing.-Q. Which is the best to put over the frames in winter, a solid board, a chaff cushion or a cloth, packing the super with leaves?
A. The cushion for outdoor wintering; in a cellar it matters little which, if the cellar is all right and the hive has a large entrance.
Q. I have always hesitated to remove the winter protection (chaff tray, etc.) in the early spring in order to examine colonies. As you advocate to take the bees out when maple is in bloom, would this also be a good signal to go by for removing the winter packing, or, if not, what would be?
A. If you will look again you will see that it is the soft maple that usually gives the signal for taking bees out of a cellar. The hard maple blooms a little later. Taking bees out of a cellar is a different affair from taking away the wrappings of those that have been wintered outside. My bees have no wrappings after being brought out, but some think it pays to give them protection after that time. At any rate, if my bees were outdoors and well packed, I would hesitate about unpacking them at the time of maple bloom unless I thought there was danger of their being short of stores, and even then it might be worth while to return the packing until about the time of fruit bloom.
Winter Quarters, Removing From.-Q. How soon will it be safe to take ont of their winter chaff-lined boxes and put on summer stands, bees that are in single-walled hives? (Iowa.)
A. If the bees are not to have their stands changed, and can have a flight without removing any packing, it is better for the bees to have the warmth of the packing until it is fairly hot weather, say about the last of May in your region.
**Winter Stores.--Q**. How much honey should I leave in each hive as a winter supply for the bees?
A. A store of 30 or 40 pounds is none too much for wintering outdoors, a stronger colony needing more than a weaker one, and for cellaring, 10 pounds less will do. Better five pounds too much that five ounces too little. The overplus will not be wasted.
Q. Are eight Langstroth frames full of honey enough to winter a strong colony of bees out-of-doors? I pack in leaves, three in a shed, six inches of space between each hive.
A. Yes, less than eight frames; six would do if well filled.
Q. Will the bees go through winter with as small an amount of honey as 15 or 20 pounds, when in the cellar?
A. In some cases they would, but it would not be safe to risk it.
**Wintering.--Q**. In preparing bees for winter, would it be best to leave the hive full of honey, or leave some empty combs for brood?
A. Don't you worry about room for brood. The best you can do at getting the brood-chamber filled with honey, no doubt there will be by spring plenty of room for brood, and the bees need no room for brood late in the fall. Some, however, think it better for them to have some empty cells to cluster on in winter, but they will have these emptied out in good time.
Q. Will it be safe to winter bees on combs with nearly all cells partly full of honey, but little or no capped honey?
A. Not very safe, but it might succeed.
**Wintering in a Building Without Flight Opportunities.--Q**. I wintered my bees in the granary last winter, and of 19 colonies only 8 lived through the winter. They seemed to be troubled with dysentery, and the stuff they passed was one-quarter of an inch thick on top of the frames. The last 4 hours of the bees' lives they seemed to pass nearly a teaspoonful, and all of very bad odor. This winter I left them on the summer stands with these results: From 18 colonies all but 3 died of the same disease. The hives are full of nice looking honey. Would it be all right to put a colony of bees in these same hives without removing the honey? I have an idea that the sudden change in temperature caused the hives to become damp, and thus the disease.
A. The likelihood is that the granary was too cold a place. A well ventilated cellar might give better results, being warmer. It is possible, also, that they were not packed warmly enough on the summer stands, especially on top. It is just possible, also, that the honey was at fault, but in that case it would likely be darkfrom honeydew. It will be all right to use these hives without removing the honey. Even if it should be honeydew, the bees can stand that all right when flying daily.
**Wintering in a Building With Entrances Arranged for Flight.-Q. I have my bees in the attic, facing east, and it is so arranged that the temperature can be controlled during the winter months. During the most severe weather the past winter it has not been below 32 degrees, and never above 40 unless the weather out of doors was warm enough for them to have a flight. What would be the best temperature and cause them to consume the least amount of stores, with the hive-entrances open to the weather at all times as they are now?**
A. About 50 degrees, but there is a good deal of variation in thermometers.
**Wintering in Cellar.-Q. How many cubic feet per colony is required in cellar wintering? I am thinking of putting the bees indoors.**
A. Something like ten, including passage way.
Q. In cellar-wintering, must it be dark in the cellar?
A. Yes, unless the bees keep perfectly quiet in the light. When first put in the cellar they don't seem to mind the light munch, but do a great deal toward spring.
Q. In wintering bees in the cellar, do you leave the bottom-board off the hive for ventilation?
A. My bottom-boards are left on; but that still leaves abnnd-ant ventilation, for the space under bottom-boards is two inches, and the entrance is two inches. deep and the whole width of the hive. If I had entrances not more than half an inch deep, I should want the hives blocked up or the bottom-boards taken away entirely.
Q. Do you put on anything to keep out the rats and mice, if such enemies should come along, or will the bees take care of their combs and honey in such a case themselves? I think Prof. Cook says that he leaves the bottom-board on and the entrance wide open.
A. I have done both ways. You may be sure the bees will not take care of themselves; rats and mice will make bad work if allowed undisputed possession. If you leave the hive-entrances open, in most cellars, you must keep up au unceasing warfare against rodents with traps and poison. You can bid defiance to the nuisances, however, by having the entrances closed with very coarse wire-cloth--three meshes to the inch. Even then you will have some trouble, for field mice will have entered some of the hives before being brought into the cellar. It is better, however, to have a mouse confine its loving attention to one colony than to give it the free run of all.
Q. Do you recommend sealed covers for cellar-wintering, the cellar being damp?
A. I put my bees in the cellar with covers sealed down; but they have entrances full width two inches deep. With very small entrances there should be upward ventilation.
Q. Do bees always keep on humming in the hives all winter when in the cellar, in which the temperature is 45 degrees? If not, please tell me the cause.