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Gillmore's System Doubted

Categories: HIVES.
Bee Keeping: Mysteries Of Bee-keeping Explained

Now this fact is not known by a recent patentee from the State of

Maine, (else he supposes others do not,) as he recommends placing bees

in a house, and empty hives in connection with the one containing bees,

and in a few years all will be full. He has discovered a mixture to

feed bees, (to be noticed hereafter); this may account for an unusual

quantity being stored by an ordinary sized family. He said another

thing, t
at is, each of these added hives would contain a queen! This

would seem to explain away the first difficulty of the continued

increase of bees, and so it would if it did not get into another

equally erroneous; one error never made another true. This idea of bees

raising a queen, merely because they have a side box to the main hive,

is contrary to all my experience, and to the experience of all writers

(except himself) that I have consulted. If the principle is correct,

why not sometimes raise a queen in a box on the top or side for us? I

never discovered a single instance, where two perfect queens were

quietly about their duties in connection with one hive. The deadly

hostility of queens is known to all observing apiarians. Not having the

least faith in the principle, I will leave it.



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