494 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



OC'L\ 



one, and drove out tho bees with a little smoke. 

 Her royal majesty is a lovely queen — one of tho 

 prettiest I ever saw, and I hope T shall succeed in 

 building the little colony up. I did not confino them 

 to tho hive, as they bad plenty of brood in all stages 

 of development in tho frames given them, and I 

 have protected them well from the cold. 



Now, friend Root, I thank you for the careful 

 maniuT in which the bees were put up, but I think 

 a little "reform "is needed in the candy, and per- 

 haps in the bottles, to stand a very long trip. 



R. E. TliMONEY. 



Smyrna, Maine, Aug. 30, 1883. 



But why any " reform," friend T.V You 

 say the bees came through that long distance, 

 with only about a dozen dead. Is not that 

 well enough, even if the candy was llinty V 

 Again, you say they had built a piece of 

 comb, and tilled it with honey. We assured- 

 ly did not put a particle of comb in the cage, 

 and so we must conclude the little fellows 

 felt so much at home, even with their hard 

 candy and water, that they went right to 

 work. The desideratum I have for years 

 sought, was to so prepare bees that they 

 could get the daily supplies they need on the 

 way, so as to get them to comb-building in 

 the natural way, and your report seems to 

 indicate we have succeeded. If the candy 

 is softer, they dig it out and rattle it out of 

 the cages, and waste it on the way. Now, 

 friends, wlien you can get yonr bees to build- 

 ing new comb, and keep them at it, they are 

 always thriving ; and when we can so ar- 

 range our feeding as to obtain this result, 

 we nave all we can ask for. 



FOUNDATION ON HORSEHAIR. 



nORSEIIAIU VERSUS WIRE. 



M FTER a thorough trial of wired frames we have 

 J^^_ discarded them and adopted something which 

 ' gives better results in the hive, besides sav- 

 ing half to three-fourths the time spent in wiring. 

 This is how we do it: We get nice long hairs from 

 the luxuriant tail of one of our horses (and, by the 

 way, it's astonishing what a number can be taken 

 without his missing them), and having dipped our 

 wax sheets thin, lay two together with the hairs 

 thick enough between them to roll out 3'/i to 3V4 in. 

 apart, and then roll them with our nine-inch Root 

 fdn. rolls to the desired thickness. We then use the 

 fdn. just as we all did before discovering the neces- 

 sity of having something to prevent sagging of the 

 combs. The first trial of the hair which we made, 

 we just stuck it to one side of a single wax sheet, 

 and thus rolled it. In one or two instances we found 

 the bees would pull it out some. But since rolling 

 it between the sheets as mentioned, not a single in- 

 stance of contrariness has occurred. We have given 

 it a thorough test this season in all kinds of weather, 

 and have universally got nice straight even combs, 

 which stay firmly to their place, whatever the weight 

 of brood or honey, or thinness of comb. These re- 

 sults we have not always obtained with wire, with- 

 out close watching and manipulation to keep the 

 bees from bulging the fdn. from the wires. They 

 can't bulge it from the hair, if they do commence 

 their work on one side, and the increasing weight 

 keeps them straight. We think it just the thing, 

 and the ease and speed of making it upon any kind 



of fdn. machine will recommend it to those who 

 have all the solid work they can do to keep up with- 

 out puttering with the wired frames. Those who 

 are troubled with sagging top-bars can retain the 

 diagonal brace you use. We use a comb-guide %x 

 a scant 'a, fitted firmly into the grooves in top and 

 end bars; and though we sustain the middle of the 

 section cases by laying a ■'„ strip on the top-bars, 

 we are never troubled by their sagging. 



I have already made this too long, but would like 

 to say that the quickest way to put the hairs between 

 tho sheets is for one to bold them outstretched 

 across as many sheets laid side and side as they will 

 reach, while another lightly strokes them, just 

 enough to make them Stick, with a common putty- 

 knife. You will readily see that but half the sheets 

 are to be thus treated and matched with the other 

 ready 1o be rolled; also, that I may not be asked to 

 tell who ICC are, that I went regularly into bee-keep- 

 ing with my father, Thos. C. Stanley, last spring; 

 not, however, being a novice in the art of hive-mak- 

 ing, selling, transferring, etc. And he desires that 

 I shall have the credit, if there's any in it, of the 

 hair improvement, as it was mj' suggestion, though 

 our joint experiment. I. H. Stanley. 



Fairfield, 111., Aug. 38, 1883. 



Horsehair was suggested a long time ago, 

 and experimented with ; but, if I am cor- 

 rect, it was discarded because the bees would 

 bite it out at times when no honey was com- 

 ing, and also that it didnot have the strength 

 we wished to enable frames to bear trans- 

 l)ortation, etc. Our young friend who writes 

 the above, has, it would seem, remedied the 

 lirst objection, by rolling the hairs between 

 two sheets. As dipped sheets usually have 

 one thin end, by reversing we may now 

 have fdn. with walls of an equal height over 

 its whole surface. While the plan will pre- 

 vent sagging, without a doubt, it will not 

 give us combs firmly fastened into the frames 

 at both tops and bottoms, as we have them 

 with the wires woven into the frames. 

 Neither can I quite divest myself of the idea 

 that bees would not bite out the hairs, when 

 they were not getting stores, or during 

 severe dearths of honey in the fields. Are 

 there horses enough in the land to supply 

 the demand, friend S.V and are you sure it 

 won't result in having the poor beasts go 

 around with denuded tails in lly time, if we 

 adopt your suggestion V Many thanks, nev- 

 ertheless, my friend. 



FOUIi BROOD. 



ITS DANGERS, AND THE WISEST THING TO BE DONE 

 WHEN IT ONCE GETS INTO YOUR APIARY. 



M FEW weeks ago a friend wrote us for 

 ^^ advice in the matter of foul brood. 



' Not having experience, we referred 



him to friend Muth, who, after receiving 

 from him a sample of the diseased brood, re- 

 plies as follows : — 



Mr. H. Scranton, Dinidec, Mich.:~Your favor of 

 the 1st inst. is at hand, inclosing a sample of brood 

 comb. I am sorry to say that you are in a rather 

 bad fix concerning your bees. It is the interest of 

 every one of your neighbors keeping bees, to assist 

 you in eradicating this dangerous disease. That 

 small piece of comb represents the worst kind of 

 malignant foul brood. I feel very safe in saying 



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