THE APIARY.

Otago Witness, Issue 3518, 16 August 1921, Page 7

THE APIARY.

By

J. A.

WORKING AVITH THE BEES RATHER THAN AGAINST THEM. To say that we "prevent swarming by raising- combs of brood into the super," as s, uio have said, is to grasp for a rule where a rule is unwise, if not impossib.e, and miss the spirit of tho system. When we find that queen cells have been built we destroy them; but to speak of preventing swarming by “cutting out the queen cells" is to truss the point entirely, for the sort of practice which that implies is nothing' but locking the stable after the horse has been stolen. Perhaps it is not quite so bad, and a balky horse may be better than none at ail. ihe above is quoted from Mr Morley Bettit, who may be classed as one of the best of _ present day American bee-writers, and it is well supported in his article in •June Gleanings. Any of us who practise what is known as the Alexander method of swarm prevention will know how disappointing it ; often is when you look in alter the brood has been pul above a.u excluder to find that there has been a strike, and that little progress has been made by the queen in the cLevelopmnt of the new brood nest.. The fact is that the position is an unnatural one. The queen wants through that excluder into her brood nest, and will often light for days to get there, losing the time tor the laying of thousands of eggs. In this case the arbitrary rule that we make runs counter to the instinct of the bees, and as Mr Bet tit would say we have a balky horse to put up with. It was to get more into line with the bees that for some years we have advocated the Doolittle method of leaving the brood below, but putting the queen and one frame of brood above the excluder; this, it done at the right time, is usually very much more in line with bee ideas, and a splendid development: of brood may be expected. Mr Bettit’s idea is io use nice black brood combs, and to put tho super on with an excluder, and allow the queen to g.o up and take possession of her own accord. We do not know that the difference between this and the Doolittle method will be very perceptible, but Mr Bettit claims that it is almost as satisfying to a colony as if they had swarmed. 'J his we certainly do know, that the result will be a delay of at least three weeks in swarming. By that time most of the bees below have hatched, and the queen is then put down, which forms another very satisfactory change for the bees. Meantime, during the time that the queen worked in the super, in order to give plenty of room a further super is put on, but this time over an excluder. The plea being that plenty of room must be given for store.-: for brood and for bees ; plenty of room for ventilation, so that, however 'hot or oppressive, tho bees may all get on to the combs and not cluster outside. AA’hen tile queen is put below, the excluder keeps her there, and the brood nest she has just left goes to tho top, extracting combs coming between. This is all very much in line with what we have all along been advocating, only Mr Bettit lias perhaps consulted tho bees themselves a wee bit move, and so, by gaining their approval, got them to work a bit harder. And that is where ho has got the people who rely oil “cutting out queen cells” periodically badly. Tho whole system is fighting against Nature, and again it is like tho balky horse —it is better than none. Mr Pettit’s idea whore he comes into touch with a colony that will persist in building cells is decidedly good. He blames the queen and removes her, then eight or liiuo days later ho cuts out the cells si uric 1 and gives a young laying queen; the debit is only for that eight or nine days, and then swarming is fixed for the season as a young queen in her first s a son will seldom go out.. In doing this again there is no working at cross purposes. The queen is taken away certainly, but the only remedy the b es know is to rear another one. Then, when eight or nine days later the cells are taken away, they have no remedy but io accept the young queen. Glad to find that in all their trmib'e.* there is a remedy, they accept it and work on normally. Nor so where an attempt is made to prevent them carrying out the ir swarming instincts by cutting out cells; they resent if, and fry again, and other and more important work so far as the beekeeper is concerned is neglected. Mr Pettit says of ids method that it is successful in tile majority of eases, and that to disrupt violently the colony crgam-ation t- a.s repugnant to him as he fee's it is to the Ir'es. fl'li - idea <■: working in uni-m with the Ives will appeal to cverv true beekeeper. To force them to do what is against their own nature can only result in a large amount of failure, while if adds to our pleasure ail'd to the vim and energy with which they work if we work together.