746 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Nov. 3, 1904. 



sulphuric acid ; and sulphuric acid has got down to such ex- 

 :eeding- cheapness that it is too cheap to be made with com- 

 mercial sulphur. Largely made by burning mineral pyrites, 

 md some of the mineral has arsenic in it as well as sulphur. 

 Liime takes the sulphuric acid out of the glucose ; but lime 

 won't take the arsenic out after it once gets in. Page 6()1. 



DIFFERENCE BETWEEN YODNG AND OLD BEES. 



It is an interesting fact that page 659 gives us about 

 young bees as distinguished from older ones. Many fine 

 hairs right on the surface of the large compound eyes ; 

 while from the eyes of the old bees the hairs are missing- 

 broken off, or at least gone somehow. We hardly expect to 

 be told that they pull them out, either from their own eyes 

 or their neighbors'. More likely the hairs get brittle and 

 easily break off when the proper time comes for them to go. 

 And the sweeping, catwash-her-face motion of the front 

 legs often seen, may furnish sufficient means of breakage. 

 I'll run the risk of a guess that young bees are not any- 

 where near blind, however — in fact, the editorial remark as 

 good as proves it. Where do all these hairs go to ? Rest 

 of young bee's body also parts with quite a fleece of hair 

 during the first 20 days of life — thousands of hairs for each 

 bee, and multiplied by say 100,000 bees in the course 

 of the season. Bottom of brood-chamber ought to be a 

 good place to go wool-gathering. Is it not these shed 

 hairs that give the cappings of the brood such a peculiar 



texture — neither exactly wax nor exactly anything else 7 

 I'll play that most of the shed hairs adliere slightly to the 

 wax surfaces, and then the bees slightly scrape the sur- 

 faces over, getting a mixture of hair and wax, which a lit- 

 tle kneading fits for use as brood-cappitigs. Leastwise we 

 know that the lower edges of the combs get scraped away 

 with the lapse of time. If we fit in comb it will gradually 

 get gone, and the space above the bottom-bar will appear 

 again. 



SUDDEN EFFECTS OF BEESTINGS. 



The case of W. W. Shafer, on page 660, is a very ex- 

 treme one — also an example of a rare turn or sudden change 

 which, for aught we know, any one of us is liable to suffer. 

 After having been pretty well inured to stings one sud- 

 denly becomes very susceptible to them, and continues so. 

 The case of Langstroth and James Heddon were a little 

 that way, I believe. 



EARLY SPRING CLEANING OF HIVES. 



Probably all right in Texas, but in the cold North I 

 think harm instead of good is sometimes done by such vig- 

 orous spring cleaning as that per page 664 — at least, there 

 is such a thing as doing it too early. Makes the hive too 

 drafty for the babies. Wait a bit. Wait till the extra- 

 strong colonies have got the cleaning all done ahead of 

 you ; then clean the weaker ones. 



Send Questions either to the office of the American Bee Journal, or to Dr. C. C. Miller, Marengo, 111. 



Cucumber as a Honey^Plant. 



What do you know of the cucumber as a honey-plant, 

 and of the quality of the honey 7 Michigan. 



Answer. — For several years my bees have had the 

 range of some 200 acres of cucumbers, but I confess I don't 

 know positively much about the cucumber as a honey-plant. 

 The fall yield is better than it was in previous years, but it 

 is not certain how much of the increase is due to cucumbers, 

 as other plants are in bloom at the same time. Neither do 

 I know the quality of the honey ; yet it can not be anything 

 very bad in color or flavor. Can any one give any more 

 definite information ? 



Extracting-Supers in Winter— Late Introduction of 

 Queens. 



Our honey season here is about closed for this year, 

 although the bees, I notice, are storing nectar from some 

 source — a thing I have never noticed before this late, and 

 can not guess what plants are furnishing this nectar unless 

 it be lespedesa, or Japan clover. The next move in order 

 now is to arrange each hive for the winter, and that brings 

 about the necessity of asking a few questions. 



1. Is it best here to remove all supers and leave the 

 colony in the brood-chamber through the winter? 



2. If your answer is yes, then tell us how we are to get 

 all that scattering honey out of the combs of the super, so 

 as to house and protect the same till wanted again next 

 spring ? 



3. I have uncapped honey in the supers to get the bees 

 to carry it down, but is that the right thing to do ? and how 

 much at one time would be right to uncap 7 



4. When honey in supers is not capped, I know of no 

 way to get the bees to carry it down only by outside feed- 

 ing, which is not practicable for many reasons. 



5. Will an Sframe hive, Langstroth size, be sufficiently 

 large to comfortably house a good-sized colony in the brood- 

 chamber alone, and also supply honey enough through the 

 winter 7 



6. Is there any way to save this scattering uncapped 

 honey in the supers without extracting it 7 



7. If fed to the bees outside the hive, by piling up these 



supers some little way from the apiary, and letting the bees 

 clean it up — would you recommend that 7 



8. Can such uncapped honey be kept through the win- 

 ter here till needed next spring, if left in the combs and 

 kept from bee-moth and other insects — ants, etc. 7 



9. Or would it be a better plan to extract this uncapped 

 honey now, and feed it back if it becomes necessary 7 



10. After the queens cease to lay in the winter months, 

 would it be a good time to introduce other queens, should 

 one wish to requeen or Italianize his apiary 7 would the 

 fact of their having no young brood to rear a queen out of, 

 tend to simplify the introduction of a laying queen 7 



Mississippi. 

 Answers. — 1. Most certainly, comb-honey supers should 

 be removed to avoid spoiling sections, and it is probably 

 better to remove extracting supers. I take it that you are 

 speaking of extracting-supers. 



2. As you say in No. 4 that outside feeding is not prac- 

 ticable, the only way left to be sure of getting all honey out 

 is to extract. 



3. Yes, that's all right if the bees will carry it down, 

 and it doesn't matter just how much at a time is uncapped, 

 only so it be uncapped as fast as the bees carry it down. 



4. If I understand you rightly, the bees carry down 

 when you uncap, but not that which has never been capped. 

 The philosophy of the difference is probably this : When 

 the bees find the honey freshly uncapped, it is not in shape 

 to suit their notions of neatness, so they go to work clean- 

 ing up, and when they get under headway they continue 

 till the honey is emptied; but the honey which has never 

 been capped is just as the bees left it, and so needs no 

 cleaning up. If you were to sprinkle these last combs with 

 diluted honey the bees would clean it up, and it is quite pos- 

 sible that might start them to carrying down, the same as 

 if you had uncapped it. 



5. Yes, and no. It is large enough to contain the col- 

 ony and abundance of stores ; but the bees will not be so 

 sure always to have abundant stores as they will in a larger 

 hive, and those who use 8-frame hives must see to it that 

 combs of sealed honey are given where lacking. 



6 and 7. It is very doubtful that there is any better way 

 than the one you mention in No. 7. 



8. Uncapped honey will keep throjjgh the winter all 

 right if kept in a place warm enough. 



