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## method of starting cells |
In starting cells it is desirable that the bar be placed at a level of about 8 inches from the top of the frames when standard-sized frames are used, since this puts the cells in the middle of the brood chamber where the heat is most uniform. This can be done by the method illustrated in figures 1 and 2. After cells ar... |
## difference in faces |
Here, again, racial characteristics play a large part. Italians do not as readily accept and complete large numbers of queen cells as do either Cyprians or Carniolans. In yards in which Italian queens are reared, it may therefore be desirable to keep colonies of Cyprians or Carniolans. It need scarcely be said that in ... |
## swarm box |
Since the greatest difficulty with this part of queen rearing is in getting the cells started, it is fortunate that we have a method by which the matter may be made more certain. It is desirable to get bees into the condition in which they will start large numbers of cells; this can be done by the use of what is known ... |
## 5 Descentres of box |
A style of swarm box which has proven very satisfactory in the Department apiary is made large enough to hold five frames of standard Langstroth size (see figs. 6 and 7). |
The bottom is covered with wire cloth, and small wooden strips, nailed on each end, raise the bottom from the table or floor on which the box restsand thus allow abundant ventilation. The top of the box is removable, and has cut in it two slots, into which are fitted two cell bars. Holes are bored in the latter to acco... |
In practice, this box is placed on the ground in front of any hive from which a considerable number of bees can be taken. The two side frames are placed in the box, and bees from about six frames of the hive are shaken into it, the middle frame is inserted, and the box is closed. The slots should contain the cell bars ... |
To allow easy manipulation, the lid of the box should be nailed down or otherwise secured and the box removed to a cellar or other cool place for about six hours. It has been found even better to use only one frame, properly provisioned, in place of three, placing it in the middle of the box; but for |
Figure 6: swarm box, showing position of frames and inner side of lid, with wooden cells in place, ready for bees (original). |
the beginner the use of three frames is recommended. When only one is used more bees should be shaken into the box. |
At the end of about six hours the wooden cell bases are removed one at a time, using an extra base as a plug to prevent the escape of any of the bees, and into each base is placed a little royal jelly and a very young larva from the colony of the breeding queen. It is not absolutely necessary to use royal jelly at this... |
Figure 7: Swarm box from below, with top of lid. A blank bar is in place in one slot, as used when only sixteen cells are to be started (original). |
is opened, the bees shaken out in front of their old hive, and the cells on bars hung in any colony which will complete cells. By this method a much larger proportion of cells will be accepted, and the time required is very small. A schedule, which is in use in the Department apiary during the queen-rearing season, for... |
9 a. m. Shake bees into swarm box. (About 5 minutes,) |
3 p. m. Inert royal jelly and transfer larvae to cell cups. (About 10-15 minutes.) |
9 a. m. (next day). Shake out bees and place cells in colony to be completed. (About 5 minutes.) |
While the construction of a special box and this manipulation may seem like an undue amount of labor, the schedule shows that such is not the case. In actual use in the apiary of the Department of Agriculture, it has been found not only to save time, but to be more satisfactory in every other way, particularly in the l... |
The swarm box has been criticised in various quarters as being opposed to the natural habits of the bees, and it is supposed that this is a valid reason for condemning it. It is a popular fallacy among some bee keepers that there must be absolutely no departure from the natural instinets of the bees, and a new or stran... |
## 1.4. Alley system of cell starting |
There is another method of starting queen cells which gives very good results. Mr. Henry Alley recommends that a strip of comb, with young larvae from the breeding queen, be cut wide enough for one row of complete cells to remain intact. The outer portions of the cells on one side are cut away and every second larva is... |
## The use of "cocoons." |
Another plan, used by several queen breeders, is that of transferring the larva in the "cocoon" to an artificial cell cup. The comb is cut down until quite thin (about three-sixteenths inch), and then bent back and forth until the lining of larval skins and the excreta, generally called the "cocoon" by beekepers, is lo... |
## COMPLETING QUEEN CELLS |
## Inventators. |
The carrying up of queen cells to the time when the adult virgin queen emerges is much easier than the starting of the cells. Cells once started may be hung in a queenless colony without any covering or protection, and it is an easy matter to have a large number cared for. In the practical work of the Department quiary... |
for the prospective queen breeder to study the problem. The ideal nursery cage must at the same time be an introducing cage; so that from the time when the queen cell is put in until the queen is transferred to another hive to be mated, no attention is necessary except to uncover the candy plug to allow the workers to ... |
It may also be added that any cell protector is worse than useless where artificial cells are used. Where the old method of cutting natural cells from colonies and transferring these cells to queenless colonies is practiced, a cell protector is desirable and almost necessary, since the workers in repairing the cut edge... |
The Swarthmore nursery, shown in figures 10, 11, and 12, is excellent also, but it is unfortunate that when this form is used the queens must be removed to introducing cages. This nursery is more valuable when used for keeping queens on hand for some time after mating. Queens can be removed from the mating colonies and... |
A nursery, then, should be so constructed that the queen will be separated from the workers by wire cloth; should be of such a form that any style of artificial queen cell may be placed in it; should contain a place for candy as food for the young queen; and should above all be useful as an introducing cage. The use of... |
## Introducing queen cells |
But it may be asked, " Why not introduce queen cells directly to the colony where the queen is to stay until mated?" This method is all right where time is no object; but the queens might just as well be kept in a nursery until three to five days old, and thus they need not be in the mating colony more than four or fiv... |
The practice of putting a little honey on the tip of the queen cell when in a nursery, so that the emerging queen may have something to eat while gnawing her way out is not necessary, and has, when practiced, sometimes led to the death of the queen by suffocation. |
## 7 Mating Queens. |
The best method of muting queens has perhaps been more discussed by bee keepers than any other phase of queen rearing, the bone of contention being the size of the colony which shall be used in mating. |
Some bee keepers insist that queens should be mated only in full colonies, while others go to the opposite extreme and claim that only a handful of bees are necessary to cure for a queen during this period of her life. |
## 8 Comparison of different sizes of boxes. |
A comparison of the cost of the two methods will help to solve the difficulty, for bee keeping is a business proposition, and bee keepers desire the most return for the least expenditure of either time or money. Mating in a colony means that that colony is without any new brood for about a week; and since during the su... |
The time spent in manipulation is an important item, especially where large numbers of queens are to be reared. It is more difficult to introduce a queen into a large colony than into a small one, and this is a factor to be considered, since the chances for occasional losses of queens which may result in considerable l... |
There are, on the other hand, certain disadvantages in the use of very small nuclei in the hands of the inexperienced. Queens can be mated from small boxes with a comb aren not greater than that of a 1-pound section of honey, and with a mere handful of bees; but experienced bee keepers have failed to make these work su... |
The entrance to a nucleus of the smallest size should be very small, so that one bee can protect the hive from several robbers. If, by any chance, a small colony without brood becomes queenless, it will almost invariably swarm out, and to this must be attributed most of the cases so reported. Unsealed brood undoubtedly... |
Nuclei with not more than a few dozen bees will mate a queen, and this has been done, and is being done repeatedly. There is objection, however, to the use of the smallest nuclei in the hands of the inexperienced, for they will die out unless watched, and often require restocking. In a large queen-rearing yurd, this fr... |
A size of nucleus which has proven to save both time and labor in the apiary of the Department of Agriculture is one having a comb area somewhat less than one standard Langstroth frame. The hive bodies were originally made large enough to hold five frames, as shown in figure 16: but, in practice, three or even two are ... |
The construction of the frames is shown better in the illustration than could be done by a written description. Any frame used in a nucleus should be so nude that it can be used as part of a standard-sized frame, or so that a number of them fit into an empty frame: for otherwise it is difficult to get them filled with ... |
Figure 16: Benton mating boxes, showing method of combining frames to make a standard sized frame, and positions of feelers (original). |
Figure 17: Benton mailing cages, showing construction. The larger size is for shipment to distant countries. The smaller cage may be used for shipments to Europe (original). |
The comb area is small enough in this hive for the queen to be very quickly found, and, unless too many bees are put in, this part of the manipulation is very simple. The original cost of the hive is considerably more than that of the smallest sized nuclei, but the body is much more durable, and the cost as compared wi... |
No one can deny that queens may be mated in hives smaller than a full colony, but a question sometimes arises as to whether the queens are as vigorous and prolific after being muted from small boxes. To this, it may be answered that the successful mating of a queen depends on the drones which fly in the air; and this i... |
## phenomena in mating |
In from five to ten days after the emerging of the young queen from the queen cell, she leaves the colony for her mating flight. The first flights of a queen from the hive are very short, and, like young workers, she flies in circles near the entrance, as if fixing the location. Several such flights may be taken before... |
From dissections of virgins and fertile queens, it has been found that, in mating, the spermattheen or seminal receptacle is filled with spermatozoa or male sex cells. The spermattheen is a very minute sac opening into the evident down which the eggs must pass in going from the ovaries to the outside of the body. As ea... |
In mating, the queen receives an enormous number of these spermatozoa, the number having been estimated at from two to twenty million. Since mating usually occurs but once, it is evident that these spermatozon must be capable of independent existence for five years or more, for they are not capable of dividing or incre... |
## Testing Queens. |
If the honey producer is rearing queens for his own use, they may be introduced into full colonies as soon as they begin to lay. A fair idea of the value of the queen may be formed from the number and regularity of the eggs laid in the nucleus box, and if later she is found to be misnated, or not up to the standard in ... |
Tested queens which have been kept in full colonies to observe purity of mating, and which after one season show that they possess ability to produce strong colonies, are sold as "select tested." However, it is to be feared that some queen breeders are not careful enough about this test and that queens are often sold u... |
## Necessity of pure stock. |
The necessity of purely-mated queens for breeding can not be too emphatically urged. The so-called "- hybrids," or mismated queens, produce young queens of so much variability in every character that it is very unwise to use them. There is one phase of queen breeding which would doubtless prove useful, but which has no... |
## Selection of drones. |
The selection of drones is one of the things in which the vast majority of bee keepers are notoriously careless. Queen breeders will select a breeding queen with great care and allow her progeny to mate with drones from any hive in the apiary, and just as long as this is done there can be no advance in the types. Drone... |
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