THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



349 



Durinp^ this winter season is a fine 

 time to visit distant friends and make 

 our plans for the comiiifj; summer. I 

 think it does man <,^ood to have a rest 

 from hard labor and mental anxiety. 

 In natural law nearly everj' thing" has 

 a rest durinji^ part of the year except 

 poor man; and he toils on until the 

 worn-out bodj' is lowered into the 

 ^rave. But I will stop my sermonizinj,'^ 

 and ctU j-our attention to another part 

 of our business. 



It is the caring- for the cappings 

 when extracting^. I see manj' recom- 

 mend rinsing them so as to save the 

 hone}' that will not drain out, and then 

 make this sweet water into vinegar. 

 I used to try this plan, but I could 

 never make a vinegar but that had an 

 unpleasant odor and taste, and was 

 nowhere when compared to cider vine- 

 g-ar. Then later we used to let the 

 bees clean them up; but this had its 

 bad features and we were glad to 

 adopt the following way of handling 

 them. We now use an old honey ex- 

 tractor with the basket and reel taken 

 out for an uncapping can. We put in 

 the bottom a screen of coarse open 

 wire cloth for the honey to drain 

 through, which keeps the cappings 

 back while the hone}' goes out at the 

 open faucet into tlie same pipe that con- 

 vej's our hone}' from the extractor to 

 the tanks. When this can is full we 

 empty the cappings into a tig^ht barrel 

 and set them away until spring-; then 

 when we wish ta feed our bees we turn 

 boiling water upon these cappings 

 until they are melted, and the wax 

 rises to the top, which we remove and 

 then use the sweetened water to feed. 

 Snriietimes we add a little granulated 

 sugar if we have used water rather 

 freely, an<l it makes the finest feed to 

 stimulate early breeding that we ever 

 tried In this way you save e\ery bit 

 of the honey from the cappings. with 

 but very little trouble. I think if you 

 will try this another season you will 

 never again set out your cappings for 

 your bees and your neighbors' bees to 

 clean up, nor go to the trouble of mak- 

 ing (to my mind) a very poor substitute 

 for vinegar. I will admit that honey 

 vinegar is sour enough but I for one 

 cannot go that unpleasant taste. 



Still another subject 1 wish to speak 

 of is this : During^ those cold stormy 

 ilays of winter, when time hangs 

 heavy on your hands, and especially 

 winter evenings, get out a lot of those 

 old back numbers of bee journals and 

 look them over. You will be surprised 



to see how many good ideas you can 

 pick up from them, especially the sum- 

 mer numbers that came when you were 

 so hurried about your work that you 

 hardly took the necessary time to read 

 them, and still less time to remember 

 and put those good points into practice. 

 To sum it all up in a few words, don't 

 waste any time in worrying about good 

 or bad luck, but put yourself at the 

 head of your business and realize that 

 it is according to your skill and intel- 

 lect that you either succeed or fail. 



One of the most important points in 

 the foregoing, is that of holding old 

 customers year after year. It costs to 

 find customers, and, when found, they 

 should be so treated that they will 

 return time and again. Counting the 

 cost of advertising, and the expense of 

 sending out samples and the corres- 

 pondence, it is possible that, although 

 I sold my honey at an advanced price, 

 I may not have made much more money 

 than I would have made to have sold 

 the honey to some jobber, but I have 

 tried to so treat customers that they 

 will come back to me another year — at 

 no cost to me. 



Mr. Alexander's plan for utilizing 

 the honey left in cappings certainly 

 seems practical, and, as we have sev- 

 eral barrels of cappings to render we 

 may give it a trial. 



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