Deport, Tex., Dec. 22, 1893.
How I Managed the Bees.
I put my bees on the summer stands on April 2, 1893, and found them in
bad condition. I had to move them about 12 miles over the rough roads,
and that didn’t help them. We had a cold, wet spring, and the queens
kept dying. I tried to rear some queens, but when they would fly out
to get mated, it was so cold and wet that they never returned. I sent
to Illinois for some queens, but they reported the same results, and
my colonies kept dwindling down, till out of 35 I lost all but 19,
and they were weak. I covered the hives at night with old carpet, and
put boards around them, and in the daytime I removed them to dry the
hives. As soon as it was settled weather, and they commenced gathering
honey, I opened the hives, spread the brood-nest, and put in one frame
between. I waited a few days, and spread again, and this time put in
two frames between. My hives being 10-frame Langstroth, that makes 5
frames of brood that we have.
I waited a few days and spread again, this time I put 3 frames in
between, and that made 8 frames of brood. I waited a few days longer,
then I put on a top hive, took out 5 frames of brood from the lower
hive, and put in the upper hive. I put in empty comb below in their
place, and filled the balance of the top hive with empty comb. I waited
about two weeks, and then took another hive, put in 5 or 6 frames of
brood from the lower hive, and filled in with empty combs as before,
and took the top hive and raised it, setting this empty one under it. I
waited a few days, then I extracted from the top hive, and raised the
lower one and put the top one under it.
I run my hives three stories high, and this way I had as high as 20
frames of brood in one hive.
We had a splendid white clover flow, but basswood did not amount to
much--it was too wet in the forepart of the season, but it turned dry
in the after part, and the blossoms dried it up. We got no fall flow on
account of the drouth.
I extracted 3,500 pounds of honey by the above method, and didn’t have
a swarm. I kept the brood-nest disturbed, and gave them plenty of room,
and oh, what strong colonies! I had to raise my hives and slip inch
blocks under the covers to let the bees pass in and out.
About the first of the second week of basswood I commenced to make
nuclei. First I made one of my strong golden Italian colonies
queenless, and let them rear queens; when they were about ready to
hatch, I formed the nuclei. I went to a colony and took out 2 frames
of hatching brood, and put into a hive. I put in one empty frame and
took out some frames of bees just hatched, from the mother colony, and
shook all in the nucleus. The reason I took young bees was, they will
stay, but old bees will go back. I waited a few days and gave them
two more frames of brood. Three days after I formed the nucleus, I
took a queen-cell from the colony I made queenless. Now my colony is
completed. In this way I wasn’t bothered with swarming, and increased
from 19 colonies to 50--all good, strong colonies, and took 3,500
pounds of nice, white honey.