lEntered aa second-clasa matter at the Post-Office at Hamilton, 111., under Act of March 3, 1879.) 



Published Monthly at $1.00 a Year, by American Bee Journal, First National Bank Building 



C. p. DADANT, Editor. 



DR. C. C. MILLER, Associate Editor. 



HAMILTON, ILL, JULY, 1913 



Vol. LIII.— No. 7 



Editor LAJL 



Comments 



Does the Lo.s.s of a Stiug: Cause a 

 Bee'.s Death? 



In Bien. Centralblatt, page 7, is quoted 

 the experiment of G. M. Doolitlle, who 

 confined, in a cage, bees which iiad lost 

 their stings together with others still 

 having their stings, and found no dif- 

 ference as to length of life. Dr. Zan- 

 der repeated the experiment, and found 

 the mutilated bees quite feeble at the 

 end of four days, while the others were 

 still quite lively. It would be interest- 

 ing to know whether the loss of the 

 stings occurred in exactly the same 

 way in the two cases. In any case it 

 seems that a bee may live a consider- 

 able time after losing its sting. 



C. C. M. 



We once had the curiosity to test 

 this matter. A half dozen bees were 

 placed under a glass bell, after their 

 stings had been removed carefully so 

 as to damage the internal organs as 

 little as possible. To these were added 

 several bees direct from a hive, and 

 also several which had lost their stings 

 in the usual manner. All the bees 

 were then supplied with plenty of food. 

 At the end of five days, all the bees 

 which had lost their stings naturally 

 had died. At the end of twelve days, 

 the six whose stings had been removed 

 carefully were also dead, while only 

 one of the bees direct from the hive 

 had succumbed, the others appearing 

 about as lively as ever. — Editor. 



May Disease Cure 



Miss Merta Mitchell, of Keokuk, 

 Iowa, reports a radical cure of the May 



disease by sprinkling the bees with an 

 infusion of senna leaves. This mild 

 physic is licked up by them as the best 

 way to get rid of the spray. This is 

 surely not expensive, and it is worthy 

 of a trial. 



Solar Wax Extractors vs. Water 

 Keuderiug 



In one of the foreign bee-journals 

 remarks have been made recently upon 

 the inadvisability of using the solar 

 extractor for beeswax when old combs 

 are to be rendered. The writer of the 

 article says the result is nil. 



Solar wax extractors are very useful 

 in an apiary, but it is mainly for the 

 purpose of saving bits of wax that 

 would otherwise be lost or neglected. 

 When handling bees, the average api- 

 arist likes to do away with the bur 

 combs, braces and bridges, which the 

 bees are so fond of building at the up- 

 per edge or against the ends, when- 

 ever they are a little crowded for 

 room. These bur combs cause bees to 

 be crushed in handling who would 

 otherwise be safely handled ; they are 

 in the way of the supers. But we need 

 to remove them constantly because 

 every season the bees build new ones. 

 In an apiary there is nothing better 

 than throwing those bur combs at once 

 in a solar extractor. They are out of 

 the way, and become wax without any 

 labor or further attention on our part. 



In rendering old combs, the case 

 is different, and there are many api- 



arists who are ready to assert that very 

 old, thick, black combs yield no wax. 

 This is true if the solar extractor is 

 used. Why ? 



Have you ever tried to dip your 

 fingers into melted wax, at a sufficiently 

 low temperature not to burn you fin- 

 gers ? If you have done so with a dry 

 finger, you have been sorry of it at 

 once, for the wax has soaked into the 

 pores of the skin and has been re- 

 moved with great difficulty. If you 

 have moistened your finger slightly, 

 you have experienced less difficulty, 

 because the moisture has prevented 

 the wax from sticking. But if you 

 have moistened your hand thoroughly, 

 after having singed the hair to which 

 the wax might fasten itself, and have 

 slightly oiled your nails, because they 

 never get sufficiently moist, you will 

 be able to dip your whole hand into 

 the liquid wax and make a gauntlet of 

 wax which will assume the shape of 

 your fingers and will be loosened read- 

 ily, with a little care. The action of 

 the wax upon the cocoons and the so- 

 called " slum-gum " is exactly the same 

 as its action upon your fingers. If the 

 old combs be thoroughly moistened 

 by sufficient soaking previous to ren- 

 dering, the wax will not stick to them 

 but will readily float at the top of the 

 boiler, when heat is applied. The only 

 need is to soak them long enough to 

 wet them thoroughly. This point is of 

 more importance than many people 

 believe, and it is only necessary to 

 give it a trial to realize its correctness. 



Has the reader ever made a compari- 

 son between a freshly-built comb and 

 an old one in which hundreds of gen- 

 erations of young bees have left their 

 cocoons, at the rate of from 5 to 20 

 hatchings in each year ? Then think 

 of the soiling of this same comb by 

 generation after generation of drones. 



