QUIETING AND MANIPULATING BEES.
The demeanor of bees toward an individual depends largely upon his
bearing and treatment of them. Langstroth, in his excellent treatise,
Langstroth on the Honey Bee (p. 193, revised edition), says:
Let all your motions about your hives be gentle and slow; never crush
or injure the bees; acquaint yourself fully with the principles of
management, and you will find you have little more reason to dread
the sting of a bee than the horns of a favorite cow or the heels of
your faithful horse.
[Illustration: Fig. 12. Use of veil and bee smoker. (Original.)]
Most bee manipulators, however, grow somewhat indifferent to stings,
since in time they become so inoculated with the poison of the bee that
the pain of the sting is less severe and the swelling slight. _But to
avoid the stings is, with some of the races more recently introduced
into this country, simply a question of care in manipulation and a free
use of smoke._ It is not meant that the bees should be stupefied with
smoke, but merely alarmed and subjugated, and whenever they show any
disposition to act on the offensive recourse is to be had to smoke. It
is not necessary that the smoke should be from a particular source,
but that from certain substances, as tobacco, subjugates them more
quickly, while burning puffball stupefies them for the time. There are
some objections to these substances which do not apply to wood, either
partially decayed or sound, and as the latter when in a good smoker
holds fire best and is very effective, it is advisable to keep a good
supply at hand. Seasoned hickory or hard maple are best, though beech,
soft maple, etc., are good. The most improved bellows smokers, when
supplied with such fuel sawed 5 or C inches long and split into bits a
half inch or less in size, will burn all day and be ready at any time
to give a good volume of blue smoke, by which bees of most of the races
now cultivated in this country are subdued at once.
[Illustration: Fig. 13.--Manipulation--removing comb from hive.
(Original.)]
With Italian or black bees a puff or two of smoke should be given at
the hive entrance and the cover and honey board, or quilt, removed
slowly and carefully, smoke being driven in as soon as the least
opening is made and the volume increased enough to keep down all bees
as fast as the covering is removed. The smoker may then be placed on
the windward side of the hive to allow the fumes to pass over the top
and toward the operator. The frames may then be gently pried loose and
lifted out carefully, without crushing a bee if it can be avoided.
Crushing bees fills the air with the odor of poison, which irritates
the bees. So also when one bee is provoked to sting others follow
because of the odor of poison.
Too much smoke will often render certain manipulations difficult; for
example, when queens are to be sought out, or nuclei or artificial
swarms made, volumes of smoke blown in between the combs will drive
the bees from them so that they will cluster in clumps on the bottoms
of the frames or in the corners of the hives. A little observation and
judgment will enable one to know when the bees need smoke and how much
of it to prevent any outbreak on their part, which it is always best to
forestall rather than be obliged to quell after it is fully under way.
The frame hive as now made--with metal rabbets and arrangements
for surplus honey, and quilts instead of honey boards--reduces
propolization to a minimum and renders the danger of irritating the
bees by jarring when manipulating much less. As a prerequisite to rapid
and safe manipulation _perfectly straight combs are necessary_.
[Illustration: Fig. 14.--Manipulation--tilting to bring reverse side of
comb in view. (Original.)]
[Illustration: Fig. 15.--Manipulation--reverse side of comb brought to
view. (Original.)]
[Illustration: Fig. 16.--Manipulation--examining verse side of comb.
(Original.)]
With the common or black bees it is never safe to do without the veil
as a protection to the face, and with these bees it will also be very
difficult to avoid stings on the hands unless considerable smoke has
been driven into the entrance beforehand and time has been given the
bees to get well filled with honey before the hive is opened; even
then frequent recourse to smoke will generally be necessary. Blacks
are by far the most troublesome of all races about flying from their
hive entrances to sting in an unprovoked manner. Next to these are
the crosses containing the blood of the blacks. Italians have much
less of this disposition, and Carniolans and Cyprians rarely, then
latter almost never, fly from their hive entrances to attack unless
their hives have been disturbed. _Pure_ Cyprians can generally be
handled without the use of the bee veil by skillful bee manipulators
who understand the qualities of the race. Much of the work among pure
Italians can be done without a veil after one has gained experience
in manipulation. During four years' residence in Carniola the writer,
manipulating annually several hundred colonies of bees, never had
occasion to employ a bee veil. If no bees but gray Carniolans of pure
blood are in the apiary and some smoke is used a veil will never be
necessary. They maybe handled in all kinds of weather, early and late,
even during the night, yet with but a small part of the risk which
attends the manipulation of other races. Nor will it be necessary to
delude them with smoke from time to time, as one is obliged to do with
blacks. To dispense entirely with the bee veil is a more important
consideration, especially to the professional bee-master, than is at
first apparent to the inexperienced. Its use injures the eyesight
seriously, especially where one is obliged to strain his eyes for hours
to see eggs, larvæ, etc., in the cells, to hunt out queens and queen
cells, and adjust frames. Besides this, the hindrance to rapid work
which the veil causes, as well as the great discomfort in wearing it
for hours during hot weather, are considerations worth weighing.
[Illustration: Fig. 17.--Quinby closed-end frames. (From A B C of Bee
Culture.)]
To recapitulate: To secure easy, rapid, and safe manipulation
accurately made hives, with the frames, if hanging, arranged to rest on
folded metal rabbets, and the combs perfectly straight, are essential.
It is equally important also that some one of the gentler races be
kept Furthermore, a good bee smoker fed with dry fuel is necessary,
while the bee escape to clear supers without manipulation of combs is a
great help. Quilts, queen excluders, and bee escapes reduce the amount
of manipulation required, and at the same time facilitate what is
absolutely necessary.
In general, the best time to manipulate hives is when most of the bees
are busy in the fields. The young bees left at home are most easily
controlled and the old ones returning are generally laden.