384 



November, 1913. 



American Hae Journal 



Mr. Hall's Ho.sey House and Horse that Has Seen 20 Year's Service Hauling to 



AND FROM Out-apiaries. 



at the ''tea party." It is the section 

 which looks best on the//t(/f, and not 

 the section that looks best on the 

 counter that will finally win. The more 

 or less perple.xing problem of getting 

 the tender comb ont of its covering of 

 wood without mangling the whole 

 affair, has got to be surmounted before 

 it can appear as the choicest ornament 

 of the tea table. The good hostess will 

 always choose that section when buy- 

 ing (where she can have her choice), 

 which has a row of empty or unsealed 

 cells all around next to the wood, pro- 

 vided the rest of the comb is nicely 

 capped with snow-white wax. With 

 such a section the servant girl, or even 

 a child, can see where to cut, and there 

 is comparatively little cutting to do. 

 And when the wood of the section is 

 lifted off, instead of having all the cells 

 on the sides "dauby" with running 

 honey, the edges of the cake are all 

 nicely rounded off, and will remain so. 

 These transparent side cells will show 

 the honey through them and set the 

 mouths of all to "watering" for a 

 taste. 



But with " Bridget " undertaking to 

 cut the honey from one of those filled 

 to overflowing sections what do we 

 have? With a case-knife in an un- 

 stead} hand she proceeds to cut out the 

 honey. Half the time the knife wan- 

 ders away from the wood. Beside the 

 main square, several thin slices of 

 comb with running honey have to be 

 stacked on one side of the plate or put 

 on top, to the serious detriment of 

 looks. Then there will be a trouble- 

 some scraping of the section to save 

 all the honey, or else there will be a 

 dauby, dripping thing to dispose of in 

 some way, with the risk of having 

 honey dripped or daubed on the table- 

 cloth, floor, or somewhere else to ruffle 

 the feelings of any person who cares 

 how the house looks. 



Then, by the time the tea-party is 

 ready for its meal, the nice comb of 

 honey is "swimming," so to speak, in 



the drip from the broken cells at the 

 sides ; thus giving it the appearance of 

 comb honey swimming in extracted, 

 as is sometimes seen in glass jars on 

 the market. 



Fiillness of section is not the great 

 desideration some would have us be- 

 lieve. Yet this fullness of section and 

 a consequent theory that it looks bet- 

 ter and will sell better on that account 

 is the chief argument advanced in its 

 favor by its advocates. It is claimed 

 that these full sections will bring a 

 cent or two moreperpound than those 

 which are not capped to the wood all 

 around. I have not fouud it so. On 

 the contiary. a case of 20 of these filled 

 to overflowing sections weigh more 

 than buyers wish them to. This vear 

 the order has been that the net weight 

 of a case of 20 sections shall come 

 within 19>2 pounds or less. 



Then these very full sections require 

 more careful handling than those with 

 a margin of uncapped cells next to the 

 wood. My experience has been that 

 not one person in ten will pick up a 

 section so as not to mar it, especially 

 if it has sealed honey all along the 

 wood. Most persons will pick up a 

 section with the thumb on one side 

 and the fingers on the other, generally 

 taking hold at the top and pressing the 

 fingers, if not the thumb, into the 

 honey, which sets it to leaking. Not 

 being satisfied, the other hand is used 

 in the same way at the side, while the 

 section is tipped out of the perpendicu- 

 lar position it occupied in the case or 

 on the show table. This results in a 

 still further damage to the sealed cells 

 next to the wood. 



I once hired a man who was consid- 

 ered the most careful of any in the 

 neighbo'.'hood, to help me in taking off 

 section honey and casing it. Before 

 we commenced I took particular pains 

 to show him how the thumb and fore- 

 finger only were necessary in lifting 

 a section of honey by the wood at the 

 top, and that under no circumstances 



the thumb or fingers be allowed to 

 touch anything but the wood of the 

 section. He worked with me one-half 

 day, and spoiled more honey than 

 double his wages, in spite of my fre- 

 quent remonstrances. Although there 

 was much comb honey to be removed 

 from the hives, I told him that it was 

 necessary for me to be absent in the 

 afternoon. And it was. for had we 

 continued further it would have led to 

 an entire " break " with him, which is 

 not good between neighbors. 



Paper cartons over full sections fare 

 little better. This is the reason why a 

 part of those handling comb honey in 

 the Xew York market still demand that 

 the section be glassed the same as 30 

 and 40 years ago. One of the buyers, 

 to whom I sold for several years, would 

 not handle any other than glassed sec- 

 tions. He said that when his back was 

 turned some one was sure to step in 

 to look at his honey. Unless it was 

 glassed, when he looked up he almost 

 always saw the man licking his fingers, 

 which meant to him a loss on that 

 section. 



Borodino, N. Y. 



A New Method of Introducing 

 —The Odor Theory 



BY DR. BRUXNICH. 



ARTHUR C. MILLER gave in 

 Gleanings in Bee Culture, 1905, a 

 valuable method of introducing, 

 invented, as he said, by Simmins. 

 I tried theproceedingoften with 

 success, and recommended it myself in 

 the German bee-journals. Xow he 

 brings in a recent number of Gleanings 

 a somewhat modified procedure as fol- 

 lows: 



The dequeened or queenless colony 

 has the entrance reduced to about a 

 square inch vv-ith grass or wet >ags; 

 then three puffs of white, thick smoke 

 are blown in and the entrance closed. 

 In from 1.5 to 20 seconds the entrance 

 is opened and the qu-en is run in, fol- 

 lowed by a gentle puff of smoke. The 

 entrance is again closed for 10 minutes, 

 then opened and not enlarged until the 

 ne.xt day. 



He prefers the method with fertile 

 queens, if possible, taken just before 

 from a nucleus. I employed this method 

 several times with excellent success, 

 and could always ascertain that the 

 queen began laying a few hours after 

 the introduction. This is one of the 

 greatest advantages of the method. 



How is it that with the old-cage 

 method so many queens are killed, ac- 

 cording to my experiences ? Fori have 

 observed that a queen maybe accepted, 

 but she is mutilated, and therefore in 

 most cases worthless. I saw at differ- 

 ent times how a queen was stung by a 

 worker in the breast, and immediately 

 was paralyzed in one of her legs or 

 wings; and often I have seen such 

 queens in my nuclei, or in colonies of 

 a neighbor or frien-I It occurs oftener 

 than one would believe that a queen is 



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