Improved Queen-Rearing; or, How to Rear Large, Prolific, Long-Lived Queen Bees / The Result of Nearly Half a Century's Experience in Rearing Queen Bees, Giving the Practical, Every-day Work of the Queen-Rearing Apiary

by Henry Alley

WHEN, WHAT AND HOW TO FEED NUCLEI

I think I can save all who use my system of nuclei very much trouble by giving instructions how to care for such colonies, and to make the method a success, and prevent robbing in the apiary. Under no circumstances ever feed anything but plain sugar syrup to the small colonies. If you use honey your entire nucleus apiary will be ruined within a few hours, providing there are any full colonies of bees near them. Sugar syrup is all that is needed to keep the nuclei up to the highest standard of prosperity.

There are three reasons why such small colonies should be fed as above stated. 1. To keep them in food. 2. To prevent the bees from deserting the hives and 3, to stimulate the bees and cause the queens to fly and mate promptly. Now the last reason is very important. Unless these little families of bees are fed as often as each five days, the bees will desert the hive (swarm out), even though they have plenty of stores and brood. Of course they will not “swarm out” unless there is a queen to go with them.

Make the syrup as follows: Put 13 lbs. of granulated sugar in a 10 quart bucket and add enough water to fill the receptacle. This is about right—not too thin nor too heavy. See that all the sugar is dissolved before using.

The feeder illustrated in fig. [15] is cone-shaped, made of tin and is atmospheric in principle. When filled it is inverted; the opening covered by a piece of thin cloth, the collar (a) put on to keep the cloth in place, and when thus prepared the food will not leak out. An aperture, an inch in diameter, is made in the cover of the hive about an inch from the front edge; and as the apex of the feeder is but seven-eighths of an inch in diameter, is held firmly in place, and no amount of heavy wind will dislodge it.

Figure 14

Figure 15

The small quantity of syrup placed in the feeder is sufficient to encourage the bees for about five days, when more food should be supplied. It is understood, of course, that no feeding is necessary when there is plenty of natural forage for the bees to gather. I know of no other feeder, or system of feeding that can be applied to work so well as the one above described.

Figure 14 represents one of the small nucleus hives with the cone-feeder in position. As water during a rain may leak into the hive around the feeder, it is always placed in the front part of the cover. Always place the hive in such a position that the rear end is slightly elevated. This keeps the water from running in at the entrance, and if any water gets in at the top it quickly runs out.

The success of my nucleus system depends largely upon the manner of feeding. These little miniature colonies are unlike large colonies. They can only care for themselves when forage is abundant. Feed them liberally and success will follow.

Figure 16