February, 191S. 



American ^a^ Journal 



no race of bees in America whicli is 

 as immune from disease as the Ital- 

 ians, the Carniolans being little better 

 than the blacks. 



In a discussion as to how the floor 

 over a bee-cellar should be built, when 

 there was no tire kept in rooms above, 

 some facts were brought out which 

 might save experimenters many dol- 

 lars and a deal of annoyance. In the 

 first place, a floor should never be 

 packed with sawdust. Mr. Clark Boro- 

 dino and Mr. Kenyon, of Camillus, ha,d 

 the same e.xperience, viz: the timbers 

 which had been surrounded by the 

 packing material had rutted out with- 

 in four years, making it necessary 

 to rebuild the floors, etc. They now 

 use dead-air spaces using building 

 paper in addition. 



In the discussion of bee-cellars the 

 out-door wintering problem was in- 

 cidentally touched on. Mr. Holter 

 mann laid down a rule on which I 

 have, myself, been working for sev- 

 eral years. He formulated said rule 

 in these few words: "Bees should not 

 be wintered indoors if they can be 

 wintered successfully outdoors." 



In a way Mr. House, of Camillus, 

 endorsed this, although he stated that 

 his bee-cellar wintered his bees with 

 only Wz per cent loss. He said that 

 out-door-wiatering was preferable on 

 account of the protection the bees en- 

 joyed during the breeding season 

 (Spring,) after bees usually are 

 brought out of the cellar; this of 

 course on the supposition that out- 

 door wintered bees are well protected 

 either by regular chaff hives or win- 

 ter cases. No man could afford to 

 pack his bees after their being win- 

 tered in a cellar, just for this "Spring 

 protection." 



Another reason why Mr. Holtermann 

 has changed from cellar wintering to 

 out door wintering is, the latter meth- 

 od gave him more leisure during the 

 winter. He could pack his bees early, 

 sometime in October; then he could 

 turn his back to them 'till April or 

 May; whereas if they were in an ordi- 

 nary cellar, the latter would have to 

 be watched more or less all winter; 

 and then would come the difficulty of 

 guessing the best moment to set the 

 bees out, the robbing afterwards and 

 other unpleasant features. I confess 

 I have to agree with Mr. Holtermann 

 and I find myself building more win- 

 ter cases all the time. I expected to 

 build a bee-cellar under my shop, 

 but I doubt if I will use it for the 

 purpose intended when I get it done. 

 I am using my house cellar at pres- 

 ent and have done so for many years. 



The question of the popular section 

 of the future received some attention 

 but no agreement was reached athough 

 it cannot be denied that there is some 

 clamor among the bee-keepens for 

 greater uniformity not only as to sec- 

 tions, but as to all sorts of bee-keep- 

 ers supplies. 



We seldom have a bee-keepers' 

 meeting without the question: how can 

 I cure a lazy colony? Various reme- 



dies have been recommended. Remov- 

 ing a couple brood combs and substi- 

 tuting frames filled with comb or 

 foundation was added to the list of 

 remedies, also the changing of supers 

 i. e. — taking a super in which the bees 

 are well at work and giving it to the 

 lazy colony. It was considered an ac- 

 cepted fact that a loafing colony bent 

 on swarming and prevented from so 

 doing proves unprofitable and might 

 better be allowed to swarm. Mr. Hol- 

 termann said he gave all his colonies 

 a large entrance, as a means to pre- 

 vent swarming, in other words he 

 keyed up his hives with wedges one 

 inch thick at the large ends. He lefV 

 these wedges in summer and winter. 

 It strikes the writer that, if it is a 

 good plan to thus have hives arranged, 

 he would make the bottom board so 

 from the start and not bother with any 

 wedges at all; make the space under 

 the frames high enough to give this 

 large entrance. In connection with 

 the bottom board the writer also 

 wonders how many have found it 

 necessary, or at least desirable, to 

 have the sharp point of a nail protrude 

 above the long cleats of the bottom 

 boards forming the bee-space under 

 the brood chamber? A nail on each 

 side protruding by '4 inch will keep 

 the hive body from sliding about when 

 clamped to the bottom board by 

 hive-staples, hooks or Van Deusen hive 

 clamps. In moving bees on wagon or 

 cars some such provision is needed 

 and when using wedges as Mr. Holter- 

 mann uses them, his arrangement 

 svould be inconvenient in moving 

 bees. 



I want to mention Mr. Schamu's 

 roller bottom-board which the inven- 

 tor exhibited and explained before the 

 convention. Dr. Schamu is most enthu- 

 siastic over his invention, says it will 

 alleviate the annoyance of bees 

 swarming and going to the woods; it 

 saves a separate drone trap, because 

 it is a drone trap itself, it provides 

 ample ventilation for any occasion, has 

 room to place feeders, prevents rob- 

 bing, etc. It would lead too far to 

 enumerate all his claims. After actual 

 test in the apiary we will be in better 

 position to judge as to the merits of 

 this expensive addition to our hives 



Mr. R. F. Holtermann's address on 

 extracted honey was listened to with 

 much interest. Producing extracted 

 honey is much safer than producing 

 honey in the comb, because, he said, 

 with only a moderate honey-flow s 

 good grade of extra ted honey could 

 be produced, whereas if comb honey 

 was produced under like conditions 

 a poor article would be the result. Es- 

 sentials in extracted-honey production 

 were "strong colonies, ventilation, 

 shade, enough room given in time." 

 He prefers to use an excluder, does 

 not extract from brood-combs, uses 

 as little smoke as practicable. In the 

 extracting supers he uses eight 

 frames in place of the usual ten, and 

 when giving more room he neither 

 places the empty one under the full 



one, nor on top of it, but takes four 

 frames from the full one, exchanging 

 for empty combs, raises the four full 

 combs to the new super to be given 

 in such a manner that the full coiTibs 

 are above full combs and form a lad- 

 der for the bees to ascend. Mr. Hol- 

 termann prefers to extract after each 

 flow, to keep the diff.erent honeys 

 separate, but he takes care that the 

 last extracting comes Just before the 

 close of the harvest. He does not like 

 to open hives for taking honey when 

 bees are inclined to rob. 



During the swarming season the 

 colonies are looked over once each 

 week, and when there are indications 

 of swarming, any queen cells found 

 are broken down; for this purpose the 

 bees are dislodged from their combs 

 at least the greater part so that none 

 of the cells may be overlooked. 



When taking tlie honey, one comb is 

 taken after another, the bees are 

 brushed off and the combs placed in 

 empty hive-bodies to be taken on a 

 wagon to the extracting room. Two 

 men work together removing the hon- 

 ey, one holding the comb, the other 

 with a brush in each hand brushes off 

 the bees from both sides of the comb 

 with one operation. Mr. Holtermann 

 uses a 12-frame extractor and finds 

 a 11/2 horse power gasoline engine too 

 small to do the work. After extract- 

 ing, the honey is pumped into tanks, 

 holding 3000 pounds each, left to clear 

 itself a few days, is skimmed off thor- 

 oughly, when it is ready to be drawn 

 off into receptacles. 



Mr. French answered the question. 

 "Shall we advertise honey?" with an 

 emphatic "yes" but qualified it in this 

 way: It is out of the question for us 

 to advertise as the cigarette man does, 

 or the chewing gum man, or the 

 patent medicine man, the shredded- 

 wheat man and others, because there 

 are not the profits in our business the 

 other named people can boast of. We 

 cannot afford to spend money that 

 way; if we did, honey would be too 

 high in price, the man of moderate 

 means could not buy it. We will have 

 to advertise in a cheap way. Exhibit- 

 ing extracted honey in attractive 

 show cases in the grocery stores, he 

 thought, would be as effective as any 

 available method. Then we ought to 

 set forth the comparative value of 

 honey in our local papers. 



Professor Burton Gates of the Mas- 

 sachusetts Agricultural College spoke 

 very interestingly about many differ- 

 ent subjects. He said the stingless 

 bee was a myth or falsity. There were, 

 however, strains somewhat disinclined 

 to sting. About brood diseases and 

 germs, etc., he said: "The different 

 organisms whicli produced the differ- 

 ent diseases had been isolated and if 

 planted each would produce its certain 

 disease. Gnarly apples for instance 

 were not wholly due to imperfect pol- 

 lenization but also to a fungus de- 

 stroying the pistil or ovules." Of 

 the many appliances of later origin 

 he enumerated several that were a 



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