BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
If securing straight, all-worker combs is not the greatest advantage arising from the use of foundation, it is certainly next to the greatest. The advantages of having each comb a counterpart of all the others, to be able to place any comb in any hive, in short, to have each interchangeable with all the others, and to be able to control the production of drones, to have them reared from such stock as we desire, and in such quantities, no more and no less, all these are advantages that cannot be ignored, even at the cost of filling our frames with foundation, and securing a little less surplus. We _must_ have straight, worker combs. If they can be secured without foundation, well and good; if not, it must be used. By using weak colonies, or queen rearing nuclei, or by feeding bees in the fall, straight, all-worker combs may be secured at a profit.
Perhaps the greatest _immediate_ profit arising from the use of foundation, is not so much in the saving of honey that would otherwise have been used in the elaboration of wax, as in the quickness with which it enables the bees to furnish storage for honey. When bees are storing honey slowly, the wax that they secrete without consuming honey expressly for that purpose, probably furnishes sufficient material, and there is probably abundant time, for the building of comb in which to store the honey. As the flow of honey increases, the handling of larger quantities of nectar increases the natural or _involuntary_ wax secretion; but, as the yield of honey increases, a point is reached when honey must be consumed _expressly_ that wax may be secreted. It is quite likely that, at this point, foundation may be used at a profit to aid the bees in furnishing storage. When the yield is so great that the bees cannot secrete wax and build comb with sufficient rapidity to store all of the honey that they might gather, then foundation is certainly used at a profit. Furthermore, I have seen the yield of honey so bountiful that even foundation did not answer the purpose; the bees did not draw it out fast enough to furnish storage for all of the honey that could have been brought in. At such times drawn combs are needed in the supers.
It will be seen that this question of foundation is one to which there may be profitably given much thought and experimentation. If the bee-keeper lives where the honey flow is light, but, perhaps, prolonged, he will find it more profitable to allow his bees to build their own combs. If he can't get perfect brood combs, he certainly can allow the bees to build their own combs for the surplus comb honey. And, by the way, no comb built from foundation can ever equal the delicate flakiness of that built naturally by the bees. If honey comes in "floods," as it sometimes does in some localities, theman who allows his bees to build their store combs unaided at such a time, loses dollars and dollars. If foundation is needed only for the sake of securing straight, worker combs, it need not necessarily be heavy. All foundation in brood frames, upon which swarms are hived, should be,wired to prevent sagging and breaking down.
Copyrighted by H. E. Hill.
Orange Blossoms.
Increase, Its Management and Control.
The first, and by far the larger class, own large home-apiaries, and prefer surplus to increase. This class can allow _swarming_, if, by some simple manipulation, the number of colonies can be kept the same, and the bees induced to devote their energies to the storing of honey. The second class are the owners of out-apiaries; and while they may not be so particular about preventing increase, they do wish to prevent swarming. This accomplished, the out-apiaries can be left alone, except at stated intervals.
In reply to the question, "Why do bees swarm?" it has been replied that "It is natural," "It is their method of increase." This may be true, in part, but it is not a satisfactory answer. I have never known a season to pass in which _all_ of the colonies in my apiary swarmed or else didn't swarm. One year I had 75 colonies. They were worked for comb honey. Forty of them swarmed; thirty-five of them didn't. It would have been just as "natural," just as much "according to nature," for one colony to swarm as for another. In Gleanings for 1889 there was quite a lengthy discussion in regard to the causes that led to swarming. The chit of the discussion seemed to be that an undue proportion of younger or nurse-bees to the brood to be nursed was the prime cause of swarming. If the brood is well-filled with brood, then for lack of room the bees begin storing honey in the cells from which the bees are hatching, the result is that soon there is but little brood to care for, compared with the number of nurses, or young bees. This theory is strengthened by the fact that when bees are given an abundance of empty comb in which to store their honey, swarming very seldom ever occurs. In short, extracting the honey, or, to be more exact, giving plenty of empty comb, is the most successful, practical method of controlling increase. In large apiaries, especially out-apiaries that can be visited only at intervals, it is well-nigh impossible to keep every colony always supplied with empty combs, hence there will be occasional swarms. If there is to be some one present to have what few swarms do issue, and prevention of increase is desired simply that the amount of surplus may be greater, and the surplus is preferred in the extracted form, then the main with these desires can have them gratified.
In the production of comb honey it is doubtful if there is a _profile/to/be_ method of preventing swarming, although, of late, the practice of what is termed "shooks-swarming" enables the bee-keeper to swarm a colony, in a manner very nearly approaching natural swarming, when he finds that preparations are being made for swarming. When he finds a colony building queen cells, he knows that within a few days, a week at the utmost, the colony will cast a swarm; and, instead of waiting, and allowing the colony to swarm when it has completed its first queen cell, he takes the matter into his own hands by shaking off most of the bees and the queen into a new hive, treating this shaken swarm in exactly the same manner as he would treat a swarm that had issued naturally. In other words, the bee-keeper simply forestalls what would have occurred naturally, in a few days, if the colony had been left undisturbed. The advantage is that the bee-keeper can thus bring about the swarming when he is present to attend to it, instead of having it happen when no one is present. This plan enables him to visit out-apiaries at stated intervals, giving each colony an examination, and "shaking" those that are making preparations for swarming. A colony that is not building queen cells is not likely to swarm inside of a week, and may be left undisturbed until the next weekly visit. Another minor advantage of shook-swarming is that it does away with the uniting and mixing up of two or more swarms that may issue at the same time in a large apiary, where natural swarming is allowed. Failures in shook-swarming result, as a rule, from doing the work too early in the season, before the colony has made preparations for swarming, and in not disturbing the bees sufficiently at the time, thus causing them to fill themselves with honey, as they do when swarming naturally. Before beginning the work, it is well to jar the hive, or pound upon it, until the bees are thoroughly frightened, and have filled themselves with honey. If it is desirable to have increase, the old hive can be given a new location and a laying queen, or a ripe queen cell. If no increase is desired, the old hive can be set by the side of the new one, with its entrance turned slightly to one side; then, at the next visit, it may be shifted to the other side of the new hive, when the flying bees will enter the new hive. A week later it may be placed back upon the other side, and, at the next visit, three weeks from the swarming, the few remaining bees may be shaken out of the old hive. The shifting of the old hive, from side to side of the new hive, _may_ be omitted, the old hive being left standing by the side of the new one until the three weeks have elapsed, when all of the bees may be shaken in with the new colony. The advantage of the former plan is that some of the hatching bees are sooner thrown into the new hive, where their work will be to the greater advantage of the owner.
To avoid all danger from after-swarming it is desirable to shake the combs quite clear of bees when making a "shook-swarm," and this sometimes results in chilled or starved brood. There is a way, however, to avoid this difficulty. Set the new swarm a little to one side of the old stand. The flying bees return to the old stand and care for the brood At night the hive containing the brood, and the flying bees that have returned and entered it, is picked up and carried to a new stand, and the "shook-swarm" placed upon the old stand. Of course, the old bees that are carried to the new stand gradually come back to the old stand, and join the "shook-swarm," but it is one or two days before they all get back, and, in the meantime, young bees are hatching out, and, by the time the old bees have all returned, there are sufficient young bees hatched to protect and feed the brood.
When natural swarming is allowed to the extent of first swarms, it is an easy matter to prevent the issuing of after-swarms in a home-apiary where there can be daily attention. The plan is very similar to the one just mentioned for preventing increase when practicing shook-swarming. When the season for surplus honey closes with clover or basswood, it is better not to try to secure surplus from both the parent colony and the swarm. Hive the swarm upon the old stand, transferring the supers from the old to the new hive. If the brood chamber of the new hive is not too large, work will be at once resumed in the sections. Place the old hive by the side of the new one, with its entrance turned to one side. That is, have the rear ends of the hives nearly in contract, but their entrances perhaps two feet apart. Each day turn the entrance of the old hive a few inches towards that of the new hive. At the end of the sixth day, the two hives should stand side by side. Practically, the two hives are on one stand. True, the bees of each hive recognize and enter their own home, but, remove one hive, and all of the flying bees would enter the remaining hive. Usually the second swarm comes out on the eighth day after the issuing of the first. Now, if the apiarist will, on the seventh day, about noon, when most of the bees are a-field, carry the old hive to a new location, all of the bees that have flown from the old hive since the issuing of the swarm, that have marked the old location as their home, will return and join the newly hived swarm. This booms the colony where the sections are, and so reduces the old colony, just as the young queens are hatching, that any farther swarming is abandoned. The old colony just about builds up into a first-class colony for wintering. If there is a fall honey flow, such a colony may store some surplus then. This method of preventing after-swarming, called the Heddon method, is not _intill/lib/c_. If a colony swarms before the first queen cell is sealed, the first young queen may not hatch until the old colony has been upon the new stand long enough for a sufficient number of bees to hatch to form a swarm; but, as a rule, this plan is a success. If an after-swarm _does_ come out, I open the hive, while the swarm is clustering, cut out all of the queen cells, return the swarm, and that is the end of the swarming. If the bee-keeper desires no increase, he can pursue the plan just given until it is time to remove the old hive to a new location, when it may be shifted to the opposite side of the new hive, with its entrance turned to one side, then gradually worked back to the side of the new hive, as has been already "explained, then, at the end of the week, shifted back to the other side, where it may stand another week, when all of the bees may be shaken out, and the hive and combs removed. What little honey remains in the combs may be extracted, or, if some of them are well-filled with honey, they may be saved to give any colony that is lacking in stores at the approach of winter.
"There seems to be no good plan of allowing bees to swarm, and then preventing increase by uniting, without having an extra set of combs built for each swarm that issues, and the same may be said when shooks-swarming is practiced, but I believe such combs are produced at a profit.
There is still another plan of preventing increase, besides that of merging the old colony into the new; it is that of contracting the brood nest of the newly hived swarm to such an extent that the end of the season will find it too much reduced in numbers for successful wintering, when it may be united with the parent colony.
**ADVANCED BEE CLUTURE.**
Quite a number of - bee-keepers have succeeded to their entire satisfaction in preventing after-swarming, also in preventing increase, while only a very few have succeeded in preventing swarming when working for comb honey. Probably the only _certain_ method that has been used to any extent, in this country, is that of removing the queens just at the opening of the swarming season, leaving the colonies quencless about three weeks. Of course, queen cells must be cut out, at least once, during this interval. Although a few good men practice this method, I never could bring myself to adopt it--there is too much labor.
The man who is raising comb honey as a _business_ will find it to his advantage to allow each colony to swarm once, if it _will_, (and no more) then make the most out of the swarm. Whether the swarm and the old colony shall be again merged into one, depends upon the desirability of increase.
The driving of Bees.
Natural swarming, with its uncertainties, ansieties, and veatious losses, is destined to eventually become a thing of the past. Methods of controlling increase, preventing it altogether, or else doing the work artificially, will reach such perfection that swarming will be eliminated. Many bee-keepers are already forestalling swarming by some artificial method of increase, notably that of shooks-swarming. No professional bee-keeper worthy of the name, any longer allows natural swarming, uncontrolled, in a large apiary. The days have past when we can afford to allow several swarms, issuing at the same time, to join forces and make merry in the top of some tall tree. Even if swarming is allowed, the queens are either clipped, or else controlled by means of queen-traps in front of the entrances of the hives. Two or more swarms issuing at the same time may unite, and give trouble by attempting to enter one hive when they return, but there will be no loss of bees, nor climbing of trees. The bees will _stay in the world_, and can be brought under control.
When swarming is allowed, I believe that the majority of advanced bee-keepers now hive their swarms by having the queens' wings clipped, and allowing the bees to return to their old location, which they will do when they find the queen is not with them. Of course the queen _afternps_ to follow the bees, and is found in front of the hive by the bee-keeper, who cages her, and sets the old hive to one side, replacing it with a new hive prepared for the occupancy of the swarm. When the bees return, they enter the new hive, supposing it to be their old home, thus hiving themselves. While they are entering the hive, the queen is allowed to run in with them - and the work is done.
There is another method of carrying out this principle; that of catching the queen in a trap in front of the hive. The lower part of the trap is covered with perforated zinc, the perforations being of such a size that the workers can pass, but not the queen. When a swarm issues, the queen attempts to follow, and, eventually, finds, and passes through, a cone-shaped opening in the upper part of the trap. Here she finds herself trapped in another apartment, as the chance that she will find the narrow mouth of the cone, and return, is as one in a thousand. The use of the trap saves clipping the queen's wing, also the looking for her when the swarm is out, together with the possibility of her being lost. The objections to the trap are its cost, a slight hindrance to the bees passing out and in, and its interference, somewhat, with the ventilation of the hive. A trap placed over the entrance of a hive containing a newly lived swarm will prevent loss if the swarm attempts to abscond.
If only one swarm would issue at a time, there would be no difficulty at all in managing swarms with clipped queens. When two or more swarms come out at the same time, and no water is thrown between them, they are almost certain to unite. After circling about for awhile, the bees return. If each bee would return to its old location, all would be well; but when the bees of one swarm begin to go back, a large share of the bees in the air follow them. A few bees from each swarm, even if several swarms have united, will return to their respective homes, but the majority will "follow my leader." It is impossible to give any set rules to be followed in such emergencies. If only two swarms have united, the bees may be allowed to enter the new hive until it is estimated that one-half the bees are in the hive, when it may be set upon a new stand, and given one of the queens, then another hive set upon the old stand and the rest of the bees be allowed to enter. It should not be forgotten that, as a rule, other things being equal, a bee is worth as much in one hive as in another. Some bee-keepers, when several swarms come to one place, take supers from other hives, where the bees are working none the best, and place them upon the hive where the bees are entering. As soon as the supers are full of bees they are returned to the hives from whence they were taken. A colony made unusually strong by uniting swarms, will store more honey, but will be no stronger at the end of the season.
Another plan of managing, where several swarms come out at the same time, is not to allow the bees to return to their old locations, but put the caged queens in baskets, each queen in a separate basket, and hang the baskets on the branches of a tree where the bees show a disposition to congregate. The bees soon find and cluster about the queens in the baskets. As soon as a queen is found with sufficient bees to form a good swarm, remove the basket to a shady place, and cover with a cloth. Then remove the next basket 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 single basket, then the cluster divided up, and each division furnished a queen.
When natural swarming is allowed in a large apiary, and there is some one in constant attendance during the swarming season, I know of no more satisfactory method of managing than by the use of a swarm-catcher. With this arrangement there is no catching of queens, no climbing of trees, nor mixing of swarms--the control is perfect. The catcher is a light frame-work, about three and one-half feet long, sixteen inches square at the large, or outer, end, then tapered down to about three by sixteen inches at the small end. The outer end is closed with a removable door covered with wire cloth. The rest of the frame is covered with canvas or ducking. The small end is so made that it fits nicely to the entrance of a hive, and a portion of the cloth covering extends beyond the small end, and forms a sort of flap that can be drawn over the mouth of the catcher, and fastened to keep the bees in after they have entered. In a large apiary there ought to be as many as half a dozen catchers scattered about the yard. When a swarm is seen issuing, a catcher is quickly adjusted to the entrance of the swarming-hive. In five minutes the whole swarm is in the catcher, when the catcher is closed and set in the shade, or carried to some cool place, like a cellar. The queen is usually among the last to leave the hive, so there is seldom a failure in catching her. If swarms come thick and fast, there is no objection to leaving the swarms several hours without hiving, provided they are not left in the sun. Although there is probably no necessity for it, they can be kept two days in a cellar. When the bees have been "cooled down" in this manner, and are then shaken down in front of the hive that is to be their home, they march in with scarcely a bee taking wing. Where some one can be in attendance, the swarm-catcher reduces the hiving business to an exact system.
While I do not approve of old fashioned swarming, with unclipped quecns, in a large apiary, still, if a man _will_ persist in following that plan, I will give him the best advice that I can; and, by the way, I can speak from experience, as I clung to that method until its disadvantages forced me to abandon it. When quecns are allowed to accompany swarms, _scatter_ is the great agent by which the bees can be controlled. Quite a number of pails filled with water should be kept standing in different parts of the apiary. There ought, also, to be three or four barrels of water standing about the apiary. Waiting one-quarter of a minute for water, sometimes means the loss of a swarm, For throwing the water, Whitman's fountain pump is the best. With this a stream of water can be thrown 30 or 40 feet. If two swarms issue at the same time, they can frequently be kept apart by the use of the pump. It is not necessary to throw a stream of water directly into the center of a swarm, but along one side of it, with a sort of sweeping movement of the arm, that makes the stream fall in a sort of shower. The bees dislike water and edge away from it. In this way they can be driven in any direction. Two or three pails of water thrown in this manner upon a swarm seems to disconcert the bees, and they begin looking for an alighting place. If the operator once has a swarm well in hand, there is plenty of water, and he knows how to use it, it is well nigh impossible for a swarm to get away.
When queens are allowed to accompany swarms, there ought to be no tall trees near the apiary, as the swarms _soil_/cluster where it is difficult, even dangerous, to get them. It should be possible to reach the tops of all trees with a long, light ladder. If the tops of the trees can all be reached from a step ladder, so much the better. Besides the pails of water, the fountain pump, and ladders, the beekeeper will need three or four baskets. Clothes baskets are excellent. Upon one side should be sewed a cover of burlap. When the swarm has been shaken into the basket, the cover can be thrown over the top of the basket, and will keep the bees from flying out. Blocks of wood nailed to the corners of the cover hold it from being blown off or from dropping into the basket, should the bees cluster upon the cover. If set in a cool place, a swarm may be left in such a basket several hours. When the hive is in readiness to receive the swarm, the cover to the basket may be turned back, and the bees shaken down in front of the hive. A few of the bees soon find the entrance, and set up their "call" of a home is found, when the others follow them into the hive. If another swarm comes out, and attempts to join the one just entering its hive, a large sheet may be thrown over the hive.
Where several swarms come out at the same time and unite, the best that can be done is to divide them up as nearly equal as possible, into several swarms. When a queen is found she is to be caged. Any swarm that has no queen will soon show its queenlessness by its restlessness. The bees will begin running out of the hive and taking wing. One of the caged queens should then be given such a swarm, when, as by magic, the bees will change their behavior and go into the hive.
## Chapter 4 Advanced Bee Culture.
to a stick, supplied with tiny larvae, built out and cared for in a colony that has not even been deprived of its queen; and, best of all, the fertilization of a queen is now secured by using a mere handful of bees, where once were used at least two full-sized combs and a quart or two of bees.