Jan. 10, 1901. 



AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL, 



25 



colonies or so. Now, some bees will swarm without having 

 their cells capt ; where will your swarm be if you don't go 

 there within S or 7 days? Anyhow, the queen would be 

 gone. As I understand that you clip your queens' wings, I 

 think it would be the safest way to have somebody right 

 along with them. 



2. Why are there always some bees fanning at the en- 

 trance ? Some say it is for ventilation. I hardly agree 

 with that, because my bees had a flight yesterday, and then 

 some were fanning. If that is to cool the hive, what are 

 they going to do when it is about 100 degrees in the shade ? 



Illinois. 



Answers. — 1. You are right ; it is quite a job to look 

 thru a lot of hives for queen-cells ; you are also right in 

 thinking it would be a safer plan to have some one watch- 

 ing for swarms. But it would be a good deal of expense to 

 have an extra hand at each apiary to watch for swarms. Of 

 course, there's no law against others having a watcher on 

 hand all the time. 



Yes, some colonies will swarm, and the swarm will be 

 right there in the old hive (except in a few cases where it 

 may enter another hive.) Then the thing needed is to de- 

 stroy the extra cells, or in some way provide against a 

 swarm issuing again. 



I'm not insisting that the plan is satisfactory, and as 

 soon as I learn something better I'll drop the present plan. 



2. In nearly all cases bees ventilate at the entrance for 

 the purpose of changing the air in the hive. Even if the 

 air was none too warm it might need changing on account 

 of its impurity. In the case you mention it is just possible 

 that the air in the hive was warm or foul, notwithstanding 

 the fact that the outside air was not above SO degrees. Af- 

 ter being confined to the hive quite a number of days, the 

 bees may become very much excited upon the occasion of a 

 flight, and that excitement may run up the inside tempera- 

 ture above the desired heat. It is quite likely, however, 

 that you had one of the exceptional cases in which bees ven- 

 tilate without any need of ventilation. I'm not certain 

 whether the books tell about it, but one may often notice a 

 bee ventilating at the entrance because it has accidentally 

 got to the wrong hive, or for some reason is afraid of the 

 reception it will get. A bee afraid as to its reception falls 

 to ventilating, apparently because it thinks it will show it 

 is willing to go right to work helping as one of the mem- 

 bers of the colony, and ventilating is the first work that 

 comes to hand. When a strange bee goes to ventilating it 

 is not likely to be ill-treated by the guards. 



Grading Honey by Tinted Glass. 



I notice on page 88 some comments on the grading of 

 honey by color, by the use of tinted glass, and I wonder if 

 the idea originated among the British bee-keepers. It was 

 advanced something like a year ago in the columns of the 

 Progressive Bee-Keeper, and, by following instructions 

 there given, by the use of a number of glasses of diff'erent 

 tints it can be graded by numbers from the darkest buck- 

 wheat to water-white. North Carolina. 



Answer. — Yes, perhaps as long as two or three years 

 ago, there was some discussion in American bee-papers as 

 to the matter of grading by samples of glass, celluloid, etc., 

 and the British idea may hav^ started from that, or it may 

 have been an indigenous product. At any rate, our British 

 cousins seem to have gotten the start in the matter of act- 

 ual application. 



Does Sweet Clover Cause Bloat, or a Bad Flavor 

 in Milk or Butter? 



Does s veet clover ever bloat cattle or sheep as alfalfa 

 or red clover does ? Does sweet clover give a bad flavor or 

 odor to milk or butter ? Nebr.^.ska. 



Answer. — I do not know why, under favorable circum- 

 stances, sweet clover might not cause bloat as well as al- 

 falfa or red clover, but I do not remember seeing any report 

 of the kind, nor any report as to its giving bad taste to milk 

 or butter. 



brittle. The bees now reject them, tho placed in the very 

 center of their hives on a warm summer day. They pass 

 over them, or destroy them. Can any one suggest a 

 remedj' ? Is there any way to soften them, or make them 

 acceptable to the bees ? Ontario. 



Answer. — I don't know of anything to help, if the 

 combs are so bad that the bees destroy them. Who does ? 



Worker-Comt)S Rejected by Bees. 



I have a large quantity of good worker-combs, but 

 being empty and not in use, they were laid aside for a sea- 

 son in a damp place. < hi this account they got hard and 



The Afterthought. 



The "Old Reliable" seen thru New and Unreliable Glasses. 

 By E. E. HASTV, Richards, Ohio. 



P0I,I,EN and honey .'iT THE SAME TIME, ETC. 



Most of US know, notwithstanding scientific doubts 

 thrown at us, that bees often gather both nectar and pollen 

 at the same time, but I suppose few had right in hand the 

 positive proof to reply with which a scientist would require. 

 I am glad Mr. Davenport is able to say he has taken hun- 

 dreds of bees laden with both. I see no reason why a good 

 colony scant of stores might not be given a super of unfin- 

 isht sections in a warm cellar. Glad to hear that this style 

 of feeding marks well on a considerable scale. If honey 

 that has been fumigated with bisulphide of carbon will kill 

 a colony of bees in xhe cellar, said honey is pretty sure to 

 be of no particular good to delicate human stomachs. That 

 experiment ought to be repeated until we know whether the 

 death of the bees was from poison or from fortutious cir- 

 cumstances. Page 776. 



SELECTING .\ HOME BEFORE SWARMING. 



"Rip" is undoubtedly right that bees do not ahvays se- 

 lect a home before swarming. We may suspect as much 

 when they have a long distance from the home hive, and 

 take a decidedly different direction when they start again. 

 Also when a prime swarm comes out on a desperately hot 

 afternoon, with little or no preparation visible in the hive. 

 It is not likely that invisible preparations have been going 

 on when there were no visible ones. That virgin queen got 

 so tired in flying 50 feet that it took three days to rest her 

 enough to start again, the "born-tired" record may be con- 

 ceded to her, altho some human parlor-virgins could 

 doubtless run her close. Page 777. 



HONEY-DEW IN WINTER STORES. 



McEvoy's experiment of wintering with honey-dew is 

 instructive, especially that part of it where part of the combs 

 held good honey, and the bees lived somewhat longer for it 

 but perisht eventually. Page 779. 



CORKING A HONEY-FUNNEL. 



The cork on a wire to stop and unstop a honey-funnel 

 from the inside looks like one of those trifling but very val- 

 uable little inventions which sometimes come along. Page 



787. 



SILVER LINDEN NOT GUILTY OF KILLING BEES. 



Notwithstanding the reliability of the journal that 

 makes the accusation, I strongly think the silver linden is 

 not guilty of killing the bees. Bees died of disease other- 

 wise contracted while the accused tree happened to be in 

 bloom, I think. Such disease need not be much different 

 from the one sometimes called "footing it," when we see 

 multitudes of bees not able to fly crawling on the ground 

 about the apiary. It is not impossible, moreover, that the 

 same fungus which injures the lindens, and keeps them 

 from yielding as they used to do, also injures the bees, 

 which get more or less of the spores of mycelium. Page 

 788. 



BURNING COMB TO SETTLE A SWARM. 



Most of our veterans will smile at burning comb to 

 make a swarm settle. And yet more unpromising things 

 than that have been known to turn out well. In famine 

 times the other flying bees of the apiary would be drawn by 

 the smell of wax ; and a swarm long on the wing might 

 come, not to the smell, but to the crowd. For just once in 

 their lives the bees belonging to the swarm don't want to 

 gather anything — or do anything except "sciugle." At 

 least that's the "orthodox" view of it. Page 788. 



