BEE-spoke-data/bees-v0 huggingface dataset:
Over against these advantages stands the one disadvantage that in the nursery the bees are not allowed to come in immediate bodily contact with the cells, nor with the young queen after she issues from the cell. Some think this so serious a disadvantage as to overbalance all the advantages of the nursery. It is claimed that the clustering of the bees about the cells and the young queens does more than merely to keep up the temperature to a certain point, and that when this close contact is lacking something will be lacking in the resulting queens. Also that the young queens thus isolated and imprisoned are in a frightened condition, and that a young queen reared in such an atmosphere is not the same as one that has the feeling that she is all the while closely surrounded by friends.
So whether it be wise to use a nursery or not, it will certainly be wise not to put cells into it before it is necessary for their safety, nor to leave a virgin in a nursery any longer than necessity demands.
## 1.2. Quality of queexs.
The question has been raised whether queens reare! in the way I have described are as good as those reare! by the latest methods. I think I can judge pretty well as to the character of a queen after watching her work for a year or two; I have kept closely in touch with what improvements have been made in the way of queen-rearing, and have reared queens by the hundred in the latest style; and I do not hesitate to say that the simple method I have given produces queens that can not be surpassed by any other method.
## 1.3. beginner improving stock.
I have been asked whether I would advise a beginner with only half a dozen colonies, one of them having a superior queen, to use the plans I have given to rear queens from his best queen. I certainly should, if he intends to give much attention to the business and increase the number of his colonies. The essential steps to be taken are simple enough; and even a beginner can easily follow them. But in a few words, here is what I would advise him:
Take from the colony having your best queen one of its frames, and put in the center of the hive a frame half filled or entirely filled with foundation. If small starters are used in a full colony the bees are likely to fill out with drone-comb. A week later take out this comb, and trim away the edge that contains only eggs. Put this prepared frame in the center of any strong colony after taking away its queen and one of its frames. Ten days later cut out these cells, to be use! wherever desired, giving the colony its queen or some other queen.
Now there's nothing very complicated about that, is there?
Yet still there are some who don't want to take even that much trouble. A man says : "All I care to do with the bees is to hive the swarms that come out, and to put on the surplus boxes and take them off when filled. I never take a frame out of a hive any more than if they were all box-hives. But I have Italians in one live, and if I could I'd like to have more of that stock."
For such a one I would advise after this manner: Suppose we call your Italian colony A, the strongest of the other colonies B, the next strongest C, the next D, and so on. When A swarms, hive the swarm and set it on the old stand, put A in place of B, and put D on a new stand. All the field-bees of B will return to A, making A quite strong again. In 8 or 10 days a young queen will be ready in A to go out with a swarm. Hive the swarm, put it in place of A, put A in place of C, and put C in a new place. The field-bees of C will again strengthen A, and in a day or two another swarm will issue. Put the swarm in place of A, put A in place of D, and put D in a new place. Continue this as long as A continues to swarm, and each one of your swarms will have for its queen a daughter of your Italian queen. If you have only five or six colonies, the whole lot may be thus Italianized.
## Queens for out-apinaries.
On any day when we are going to an out-apiary and expect to use young queens, we take them from any nucleus that will furnish them, never putting any escort bees in the cage with the queen, and generally one or more extra queens are taken along, for we are never sure they may not be needed.
Care is taken that the record-book shall always show the condition of each nucleus : so we always have some idea as to which nucleus will furnish a laying queen, which one needs a cell, and so on.
already described. Often, however, when it is convenient, I take from a nucleus the frame on which the queen is found, and put frame and all in the queenless hive. If this is done at a time when honey is yielding, there is little or no danger, provided the colony has been queenless long enough to be fully conscious of its queenlessness. Indeed, I have introduced many a queen during the harvest into a colony conscious of its queenlessness, by merely taking out a frame of brood and dropping the queen among the bees on the middle of the comb. If I wish to run no risk whatever, as in the case of a valuable imported queen, I put in a hive without any bees several frames with no unsealed brood, but with plenty of sealed broad, some of it just emerging, and then closing the hive bee-tight put it where there is no danger of the brood being chilled. One way to do this is to put it over a strong colony, wire-cloth preventing the passage of the bees from one hive to the other. At the end of five days the hive can be set on its own stand, and these five-day-old bees, under the stress of necessity, will soon be seen carrying in pollen.
## artificial increase.
Fighting so bitterly against all increase by swarming, I would run out of bees entirely if I did not resort to artificial increase. Without pretending to give all the ways by which increase has been made. I may tell just a little about it.
One can make increase by drawing brood or bees, or both, from colonies that are working for honey, and thus keep all the old colonies storing, and at the same time make the desired increase. In that way the largest number of colonies possible are kept at work on the harvest, and one might have a feeling that all the increase was clear gain. But the feeling is a delusive one. It is not the number of colonies at work storing, but the number of _bees_, that count. And 60,000 bees in one hive will store more honey than will the same number of bees equally divided in two hives. So in planning for increase, I generally count that the colonies that are drawn upon for increase shall make that their business without being expected to be called upon to store surplus, while those that work for surplus are to be left in the fullest strength possible throughout the season. You cannot make something out of nothing, and if increase is to be made you may as well devote a certain number of colonies to that business.
## increasing by taking to out-apilary.
The case may be different in a locality where there is a long and late flow, but I am talking about this local ity with white clover as the dependence for a harvest. In the year 1880 I took 1,300 pounds of honey from twelve colonies and increased them to eighty-one ; but the honey taken was extracted buckwheat, and I never knew such a buckwheat harvest before or since. Perhaps it will be well to tell more explicitly how that increase was made. The success achieved will be somewhat diminished when I say that the bees were supplied with ready-built combs, so they had no combs to build. But they had no help from other colonies in the way of bees or brood except a few eggs from which to rear queens.
The twelve colonies were taken from the home apiary to the Wilson apiary, and were prepared in advance for dividing. From part of them the queens were taken and queen-cells thus secured. Ten-frame lives were used at that time, and by some help from others of the twelve, a live would contain ten frames of brood and bees without any queen, a sealed queen-cell on each frame of brood. After standing a day or so this live would be taken to the out-apiary, and the ten frames put in ten different lives. Of course every bee staid just where it was put. To each of these was added another frame of brood and adhering bees that had been brought along, and whether these bees were queenless or not there was nothing for them but to stay where they were put. In the course of time these first-formed nuclei were strong enough to help others, and the latest nuclei were built up at once into fair colonies.
increasing 9 weak colonies to 56.
In the year 1899, at the Hastings apiary, I increased nine colonies to fifty-six, making them rear their own queens, and building up mostly on foundation. No advantage was taken in the way of hauling colonies from home to divide, and the same plan would work just as well if I had had only one apiary. The increase was very satisfactory, considering how weak the colonieswere at the start. May 29 there were only forty-one combs containing any brood in the nine colonies, counting each comb with brood, even if the patch of brood were no larger than a silver dollar. I doubt if the nine averaged any more than three and a half good frames of brood each.
On the other hand, the year was unusually favorable for increase, for there was a continuous though not strong flow right through until, I think, in September.
No attempt could be made at increase until the colonies were stronger, and the first step looking in that direction was not made until June 12. On that date No. 237 with its seven frames of brood and bees was taken from its stand, and a live of empty combs set on the stand. The queen was found and put in the live of empty combs, which by this time had a good many bees returning from the field. The queen of No. 337 was considered the best in the apiary. No. 237 was now set on the stand of No. 335, and No. 335 was set in a new place. Please unlerstand that the stand holds its number, and that when the hive that was on stand 237 is moved as stated it is now No. 235. We now have on 235 a hive full of brood and bees without any queen, and while it will lose the old flying force it had, it will get the flying force that belongs to its present stand. The colony that was moved from \(235\) will, of course, lose its flying force, and will take its time to recuperate.
The bees on these two stands--\(335\) and \(837\)--were the principal actors throughout the season, the other colonies in the apiary merely serving as feeders from which to draw brood from time to time. On \(337\) was left the hive of empty combs, the queen, and the constantly increasing flying force. We now go to the other colonies and draw from them what brood they can spare without depleting them unwisely, leaving foundation in place of the brood. Looking at the record I find this was only four frames of brood. No bees were taken with this brood. An upper story was put on \(237\) and these four frames of brood put in it with four empty combs. Of course the queen and bees would soon be up in this upper story.
Matters were left in this shape for nine days, the plan being to visit the apiary every nine days throughout the summer. A stormy day, however, might extend the time to ten days, or Sunday coming on the ninth day might shorten the time to eight days.
At the expiration of the nine days, June 21, we returned. We took the brood with queen-cells and all bees from 235, and formed two nuclei. Just why we did not start three I don't know, for usually we started a nucleus with two frames of brood, and we must have had more than four frames of brood. No measures were taken to make these bees stay where they were put; it was not necessary with such queenless bees.
Then, we took the upper story of \(237\), with all its brood and bees, and put it on \(235\), taking out the queen and putting her back in the lower story on \(237\). Thenwe looked to see what brood we could get in the seven colonies that acted as feeders, without reducing any of them to less than four or five brood. This time we found six brood, which we took without any bees, and put on 237.
This was the regular program each time : forming nuclei with the brood, bees, and cells on 235 ; putting all brood and bees from 237 on 235, always leaving the queen at 237 ; and then getting for 237 a fresh stock of brood wherever it could be spared.
As none of the assisting colonies were overdrawn, they would be getting stronger, so that up to a certain point more brood could be drawn each time. July 18, for the first time, more' brood was drawn than it was thought wise to give to 237, there being twenty frames in all. Sixteen of these, or two hives full, were taken for 237, the other four were used to strengthen some of the nuclei. Not the weakest nuclei were strengthened, but the earliest and strongest, for by being helped these would become strong enough to be helpers in turn. In fact, toward the last of the season, when there was little time for nuclei to grow up, the earlier nuclei rendered substantial aid to the later ones, at least one of them yielding as many as nine frames of brood. The first nuclei were formed June 31, as already mentioned; the last were formed.August 23.
I have gone thus fully into detail, because I believe this plan can be used successfully by any one who has only a small number of colonies and is desirous of increase. The first nuclei are formed early enough in the season so that they have more than time enough to become strong colonies, and the latest must be formed only in sufficient numbers so that they can be strengthened up as soon as the queen gets to laying.
## 8 Nucleus plan of increase.
With nucleus hives for queen-rearing, as already described, it is easy to carry out the nucleus system in the strictest sense. I go to a nucleus with a laying queen, preferring a nucleus with two or three frames, take all the frames with queen and adhering bees, put them in an empty hive, and set the live on an empty stand. A week later a frame of brood may be at led. It will be better if it can be given with adhering bees, and still better if the bees can be queenless. Still, there is no great danger to the queen in any case, although the weaker the nucleus when strange bees are given, the greater the danger to the queen. A week later on, two frames of brood and bees may be added, and the queen will be saferif these two frames are taken from two different colonies. The colony will then be strong enough to be left to its own devices.
## nucleus building up without help.
Indeed, it is not necessary to do anything more than to let a nucleus stand without any help in a fair season, if it can stand _long enough_. My assistant is inclined to be quite optimistic in some things, and one August she expressed her belief that a nucleus of two frames with a laying queen would be able without any assistance, if started on that date. Aug. 6, to build up into a colony strong enough to winter. I said that would be asking too much, and we would put the matter to the test. So two frames of brood with adhering bees were put in a live on a new stand, and two days later a laying queen was given. The two frames of brood were rather better than the average, for I wanted her to see that even with an extra chance it was too late in the season for any such growth. I don't know whether she watched that colony on the sly or not, but I did. Looking at it every few days, I could see no gain--if anything it grew weaker. Then I thought I could see a little gain, and in twelve days from the time it was started the two frames of brood had increased to two and a half. Five days later there were three brood, and from that on it walked right along to a fair colony, although it had to be fed up for winter. But I would not want to count on starting for a full colony so late as that in all seasons, especially if the frames of brood were not the very best.
## increase without nuclei.
These different ways are all on the nucleus plan. Just one more way I want to mention, and it is not on the nucleus plan, but if queues are on hand I think I like it as well as any. We take four colonies, and the first thing is to have all four strong before anything is done.
Then we take an empty hive-body without any bottom-board, and into it we put two frames of brood without any bees from the first hive (a few bees will do no harm), the same from the second, and the same from the third, filling out the hive with two empty combs or combs with some honey. In the middle of the hive is a provisioned introducing-cage containing a laying queen. Upon the fourth hive we put a queen-excluder, and on this we set our hive full of brood, and cover it up. Three or four hours later, or twenty-four hours later if more convenient, this hive is set upon a bottom-board on a new stand, and the work is all done. A way that is easier, and nearly as good, is to set the hive with the six brood immediately in place of the fourth hive, setting the fourth hive in a new place. The returning field-bees will populate the new hive. Ten days or two weeks later the performance may be repeated if the season is prosperous, and this may be repeated a number of times. Of course empty combs or foundation will take the place of the two frames of brood drawn from each hive. An advantage of this plan is that it makes a strong colony at once, and there is no danger of being caught with a number of weaklings on a sudden cessation of the harvest. Each new colony formed will in its turn soon be able to take its part in the game to start still others.
## 10.3.3. Sinking bees off combs.
In this last plan, since the frames of brood are taken without bees, there is a good deal to be done in the way of cleaning lees off the combs. While it 'does not matter if a few bees should be left on the combs, it does matter greatly that care be taken to make sure that the queen is not among the lees taken. So it is well to _brush_ the combs tolerably clean, and then one can easily see whether the queen is present. Before brushing, however, most of the bees should be _shaken_ off, for if this is rightly done it will Le a saving of time.
every sort, from foundation untouched by the bees up to sections entirely filled and sealed.
## sorting the sections.
Philo sorts the sections into four classes as he takes them out, although some supers are assigned to one class or another without being taken out, because all in the super are of one kind.
One lot consists of dry sections, or those in which the foundation either has not been touched by the bees, or else has been drawn out so little that no drop of honey has been put in it. These are put in a pile by themselves.
## feeder sections.
The second lot consists of those which have just a few drops of honey in them, up to those which are not more than half filled. Some entire supers will be assigned to the first or second lot without being taken out of the super at all. When a super feels pretty light, it is inspected with some care by looking through it from the under side. If it is found that there is no honey in any section in the super, it goes to the dry pile without any taking out. If there is honey in the super, but no section in it more than half filled, it goes to the-second pile without being emptied, even if there is only one section in the super containing any honey, and that section having only a few drops.
## 10.2 bees emptying sections.
The supers of sections in this second pile are called "feeders," because the honey in them is to be fed back to the bees (Fig. 96). Usually this feeding is not done until all the "feeders" are ready for the bees. They are taken into the shop cellar, and if there are only a few of them they are put in piles bee-tight with an opening at the top and another at the bottom only large enough for one or two bees to pass at a time. If the number of supers is sufficiently large, say half as large as the number of colonies in the home apiary, then the supers are set singly all around against the wall of the cellar so as to make them as easily accessible to the bees as possible. When there are only a few sections, if the bees have free access to them they will tear the combs to pieces.
When all the "feeders" are in the cellar, then the door is opened wide, and the bees help themselves. The reasons for having these "feeders" in the cellar rather than outdoors are, first, that I want to keep the bees away from them until the whole of them are ready for the attack : second, that in the cellar they are safe from the rain. The best of these emptied "feeders" furnish "baits" for the following season.
## 10.3 unmarketable sections.
The third pile Philo makes consists of those which are more than half filled with honey, but not good enough to be marketable (Fig. 97). This pile is never very large, and is easily gotten rid of at home, together with some help from relatives. Some of it will make as fine appearance as any honey when placed on the table, although the under side on the plate may have too many unsealed and unfilled cells to admit it into the marketable class. There may also be some broken sections, for sections have a fashion of falling with half a chance.
_Fig. 95--Miller Frame._
Sometimes it happens that a section otherwise good is spoiled, and badly spoiled, in appearance, by having honey from some section above leak all over one or both of its faces. Miss Wilson hit upon a plan for having such sections cleaned up in short order, and with very little trouble. She puts them in a super, puts the super over a colony of bees, and an hour later, if the bees are active, they are taken from the hive as good as new.
The rest of the sections that do not go into one of these three piles are merchantable sections. That makes four kinds into which Philo sorts them, and you will see that it is possible out of one super to take sections that will go into all four of the piles. Of course there is always standing a super ready for any old sections of each kind, that is, a super for dry sections, another for "feeders," etc.
## 11 First part of cleaning sections.
Having now told how Philo sorts the sections, let me further tell what he does with them. When he comes to a super that does not go entire to the first or the second pile, the sections are taken out in the manner described on previous pages, leaving the contents of the super upside down on a board. The T tins are lifted off, and any sections that are not marketable are picked off and their places supplied with those that are marketable. Then the super that was taken from them is replaced by a box without top or bottom, that is, it is much like the super, only it is perhaps an inch longer, an inch wider, and an inch shallower than a T super, the exact size not being important. A piece of board is we'gled into one side, and another into one end, so as to hold the sections firmly in place (Fig. 98). A case-knife with the whole length of its edge held at right angles to the sections sweeps back and forth, and when this has made the surface fairly clean, No. 3 sandpaper is used. A cabinet-maker's scraper is better than a case-knife while it is sharp, but is harder to keep sharp. Then a board similar to the one under the sections is laid on top, and with one hand under the under board and the other over the upper board he turns the whole upside down, the super resting on one end on the table as he turns it over. The knife and sandpaper now do their work on the tops of the sections. Then the wedges are taken out, the box removed,and the boardful of sections is slid along the table to the one who is scraping. This table, which is very convenient, is 8 ft. long, and 3 ft. 9 in, wide.
## Final scraping of sections