The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1899-06-28
MIR. SIMPSON AND HIS BEES.
Further Points OF Interest About the
CatnWha Junction Apiary.

WIG EHYhtfrr OF last week only tod
y portion of the story Of Mr. II. {.
Simpson and his bees. The writer
secured from Mr.. Simpson other facts
that are Of no less interest,
For instance. it is a very common
idea among the uninitiatcd that strain
ed honey is more expensive than hon
ey in the comb. That is u mistake.
The opposite is true. For instance,
the making of comb requires a great
deal more time and labor than the
making Of honey. 1t is estimated that
in the collection Of a pound of wax,
the bees consume anywhere from II
10 ~ pounds Of honey A pound Of
wax collected can be manufactured
only into enough comb to hold twelve
pounds of honey.
For this reason, instead Of selling
honey in the comb, Mr.. Simpson is a
purchaser Of all the bees wax that he
can get at price which he considers
reasonable. With little machine that
he has for the purpose. he manufac-
lures the wax into what is called the
foundation for honey comb. This
foundation consists Of very light
sheet Of wax, indcntcd on both sides
as for cells, and apparently such a
good imitation that it looks as if even
the bees would not be able to detect
the counterfeit. But to the bees the
imitation is undoubtedly very clumsy
arrangement. They make it almost
over again before they get it to suit
their notion, and when they finish
with it, the wax is made to 60 about
twice as far as the machine was able
to make it so.
Another thing that Mr.. Simpson has
down to very fine point, is the man
agement of swarming bees. 1t is very
seldom that swarm goes off from
him. That is because he 80 we'll un-
derstands them. For instance, the
swarming tendency is controlled en-
tirely by the queen. No colony of
bees can tolerate more than one queen
in hive at time. The death of q
queen means trouble. In such an
event the bees Immediately begin their
arrangements to produce her successor.
This is done by Gaping over several
cells containing more recently laid
eggs. Then the eggs, as they develop
into worms, are either fed on differ
ent kind of food from the other bees,
or larger quantity, Of the same kind.
Within IL days queen is produced,
possibly several. In the event all at
tempts fail, the colony is doomed to
extinction. and in the event there is
more than one, the surplus queens are
made way with in some manner. 70
provide for contingencies, the bees
have queen cell or two in proper
shape all the while. If the colony
does we'll during the first honey max
ing season, it sets up new queen and
drives the old queen out with big
crowd Of workers and droncs. This
makes the swarm. And hero is where
MF. Simpsons knowledge comes in.
He is aware that no colony would at
tempt to set up an establishment Of its
own without queen, and, therefore,
he handicaps the queens by clipping
their wings. That is, he clips only
one wing-a small piece of the end of
it-just enough to prevent fight.
When swarm Of bees attempt to
go off with queen that cannot fly, it
speedily meets up with trouble. The
swarm settles on neighboring tree
maybe, and the queen may get there
also by crawling. Then, as the next
step, scouts are sent out to find de-
sirable place for hive. When the
scouts return, the bees attempt to
leave; but soon discovering that they
are without queen, they return to
the point from which they started.
On rediscovering the queen, they make
another attempt, with the same result
as before and finally give it up as a
bad job.
If Mr.. Simpson should come along
in the meantime, and this is very like.
ly, he hunts out the queen, places her
in cloth wire cage and places this
cage near the entrance to a hive.
Pretty soon the colony begins to swarm
around her, and then he sets her free
and starts her into her new home.
The other bees follow, and the opera.
tion Of hiving is over without SO much
as sting to the operator or great
deal Of trouble.
This trick Of clipping the wings of
queens, however, is a matter that must
be dealt with very cautiously. The
bees do not like the idea of the slight.