Octo'ier. loil. 



American Vee Journal 



311 



trance full-depth in summer. The bees just 

 spread out over that bic bottom in hot 

 weather— no hanging around outside tiie 

 hive. There has been no swarmning from 

 them j-ef. neither has there been any pre- 

 ventive measure taken of any kind so far. 

 and one has been in use over 5 years, a 

 second a years, and 30 are in use now. 



The idea was to give the bees a "savings 

 bank" to draw on if occasion called. If the 

 hives are entirely empty, it might not give 

 surplus in the supers, but if all combs not 

 used for brood are filled with honey, what 

 then ? Must not the surplus come up in the 

 supers, or the bees swarm ? or would they 

 become idle and loaf in a honey-flow ? I 

 doubt it. Some doubt. I know, for I have 

 taken 150 sections of honey from a single 

 colony, and my locality is not by any means 

 a good one. Land is cultivated closely; 

 farms are small; no large pastures. Buck- 

 wheat is all sown about the same time, and 

 never over 50 acres within reach, and no 

 basswood. Thus you see a bee-keeper here 

 must have his dish right side up in time. 



It's very easy to get big crops in bis-bloom 

 territory, but it's another proposition to get 

 it in a slim one. Now just stick a pin right 

 here, and you dare tell who told you. tool 

 Large bees, or small bees, is a question of 

 feed, not ciils. Last year, and the year be- 

 fore, my small hives during the severe 

 drouth, when bees, roamed the fields and 

 sucked even theiuices of wild carrots to live, 

 some colonies threw off bees of half sizes- 

 real dwarfs they were, and soon died off; 

 and at other times, with abundance of honey 

 coming in. young queens were unusually 

 large— all reared from the same cells. If 

 food is abundant they will rear large bees, 

 even if their heads must stick out of the 

 cells! You cant grow large, slick Clydes- 

 dale horses in a goat pasture, but you can 

 grow slick goats in a good Clydesdale pas- 

 ture. And that's all there is in this Ques- 

 tion of large and small bees. Its food. 



If you rear queens in one of these 15- 

 frames. the cells look like fingers sticking on 

 the combs. Now and then I get 13 frames 

 filled solid with brood. 



A. C. HUNSBERGER. 



Portland. Pa.. June 6. 



[Mr. A. C. Hunsberger's 13-frame hive that 

 has been in use 4 or 3 years without swarm- 

 ing, will awaken interest. Of course, it may 

 happen that another year will not be so free 

 from swarming, but the size of the brood- 

 chamber ought to help against swarming. 

 Nothing is said about bees building comb in 

 that 2-inch space under the bottom-bars 

 but the probability is that a bottom-rack or 

 something of the kind is used, otherwise 

 comb would be built und<?r the bottom-bars. 



Another question that arises is as to 

 whether there is not trouble with pollen in 

 sections. With frames as shallow as the 

 Danzenbaker, there has been complaint that 

 entirely too much pollen is found in the sec- 

 tions.— C. C. Miller.] 



Don't Be a " Back Number " 



Although I am a busy person and do not 

 find time to read my papers as thoroughly 

 as I'd like to. I feel that a person who keeps 

 bees is a " back number " if he or she does 

 not know what the world at large is doing in 

 the bee-business. 



'Miss Elsie A. Cutter. 



Grand Rapids, Mich., July 31. 



Good Yields for a Drouthy 'Year 



My neighbor and I have had very good 

 yields of honey, and if the drouth had not 

 cut the white clover off we would have had 

 a record-breaker for Missouri. He got some- 

 thing like rooo pounds from 25 colonies, and 

 I got 130 pounds from 3 colonies. 



Sedalia. Mo.. Sept. lo. Chas. W. Dale. 



Gathering Considerable Honey 



Bees Iiere are gathering considerable 

 honey at present from goldcnrods and other 

 fall flowers. Though I don't expect much 

 surplus from the fall flow. I think feeding 

 for winter will be unnecessary. There arc 

 very good prospects for a steady flow from 

 now on till frost. Ihis will give us hives 

 /////of yoiiuK bees to winter over, for such a 

 flow will keep the queens laying till late. 

 The early honey-flow here was cut short by 



a severe drouth. It has been very dry all 

 summer. 



From 12 colonies, spring count, I have taken 

 480 pounds of comb honey, and increased to 

 21 colonies. I have been keeping bees two 

 summers. 



! value the American Bee Journal very 

 highly, and don't feel that I can afford to 

 miss a number. R.D.Lewis. 



Alexandria. Va.. Rt. 3. Aug. 30. 



A One-Colony Apiary 



In sending you a picture of a corner of my 

 garden, with one colony in it, I hope to be 

 able to help some beginner. 



Our prevailing winds in summer are from 

 the west and southwest; the entrance faces 

 a little east of north; a rough Js inch shade- 

 board, 24x30 inches, gives protection enough 

 excepting at noon. The hive is located in 

 such a position that the small box-elder tree 

 shades it only during the noon hour. Al- 

 though this has been the hottest summer on 

 record in this vicinity, the bees showed no 

 discomfort at any time from the heat. 



By observing these bees work on cucum- 

 ber blossoms at a time when there was no 

 other bloom, I have learned that the green- 



UKK iNiKhk -> (JoLO.NV Ul- HKES. 



ish color so often attributed to sweet clover 

 honey comes from the cucumbers. 



I use an 8-frame hive with a deep section- 

 super for 4XSXiis-inch sections. The 8 frame 

 hives Iiave always given me more comb 

 honey, and better finished sections, than the 

 lo-frame hives. My largest yields have come 

 from the colonies that were not over-crowd- 

 ed with bees. My best yield in to years was 

 1000 sections of fancy comb honey from 6 

 colonies, spring count, and increased to 18: 

 with enough No, 2 and unfinished sections 

 to supply our table needs. 



Although I have kept bees in 3 States dur- 

 ing the last 10 years, and produced honey by 

 the ton. I do not feel as if I could get along 

 without the American Bee Journal. 



Du Page Co.. III. Der Imker. 



Pure Air for Bees — 'Ventilating Hives in 

 Bee-Cellars 



When we take into consideration that the 

 bee will handle from 6u to 120 different 

 batches of air a minute, we then should con- 

 sider what kind of air we are furnishing 

 them to live on. 



This old ex-minerthought it might interest 

 a few bee-keepers were he to give tiiem a 

 hunch on air. and the diflicul ties in distribut- 

 ing it into dangerous places. 



You, who have always had all the air you 

 needed, know nothing about being placed in 

 a position where there was a premium on it. 

 Miners, and bees, often find air in a condi- 

 tion not fit to live in. Impure air. foul air, 

 has created many troubles for bees; it has 

 also put together many a kit of tools, and 

 sent the miner off roving for a more healthy 



supply of It. It's queer to me, after our best 

 doctors have picked on the pure-air cure for 

 tuberculosis, that bee-keepers never say a 

 word about it to help fight this plague of 

 foul brood. Suppose mine-owners would 

 ■^'.".""^'he old miners who were afilicted 

 w-ith effects of foul air (as bee-keepers do 

 their queens in diseased colonies), do you 

 think that would help their mode of venti- 

 lation, and help to make good the cause? I 

 guess not When and where did foul brood 

 orjgnate ? It s my candid opinion it never 

 originated where bees had access to swarm- 

 ing, which is the only remedy that affords 

 the queen relief-the health-resort plan. 

 But the wise bee-keeper who resorted to 

 strategy and created plans which deprived 

 her ot this relief, was the orignator of it, for 

 he made her abide by conditions that he 

 (the bee-keeper) would have fought tooth 

 and toe-nail had he been obliged to have 

 dwelt in similar conditions. Let's give the 

 bees all the pure air needed, and 1 know we 

 will then get the better of the plague, the 

 same as we do with consumptives. 



Apparently. Dr. Bonnev doesn't think 

 much of the Iowa cellars for bees (page Sii. 

 loo many think the only requirement is to 

 ventilate the cellar. They never take into 

 consideration the most essential point of 

 ventilating the hives in the cellar. Oxygen 

 constitutes about one-fifth of the atmos- 

 phere. It IS the active and essential gas 

 which supports life. Any reduction from 

 the amount normally present constitutes 

 the most serious deprivation. In a closed 

 condition the percentage of oxygen has been 

 known to become as low as 20.35 percent. 

 When the percentage of oxygen is as low as 

 20.60. the air is very foul. Pure air carries 

 20 q6 percent of oxygen. Lack of wind-pres- 

 sure creates poor circulation in our hives in 

 the cellar, but this is easily overcome where 

 one knows air, and how to distribute it in 

 dangerous places. Were owners of coal 

 mines to adopt the same principle of venti- 

 lation which bee-keepers have, there would 

 not be coal enough dug to roast the fish our 

 fishermen take, 



Whenever you think the air will circulate 

 free y in and out a single hole, then your 

 thinker needs fixing, especially when you 

 have inside such a power of heat as a strong 

 colony will create. 



For illustration take an upstairs where 

 thei-e is no stove. The weather is cold; a 

 good, hot fire downstairs; we open the stair- 

 door, and immediately the hot air starts off 

 upstairs, and the cold air comes pouring 

 down; but when we undertake to warm up 

 the downstairs by placing the heating-plant 

 upstairs, we then fail in the undertaking. 

 Hot or warm air is more buoyant than cold- 

 it wants to ascend; it will never descend 

 unless force is applied. 



Your hive is the same— ventilation from 

 below; it is sealed and a hot-air retainer 

 through the principle of buoyancy. A strong 

 colony will create heat, also require a lot of 

 oxygen. When the cellar is warm, the bees 

 consume the oxygen in the hive, then they 

 fan and coax into the hive more oxygen, and 

 by so doing they have a further lease on life. 



When the cellar is cold, the bees will need 

 as much oxygen as usual, but they soon use 

 up what they have, and then trouble starts, 

 for they must retain life and make use of 

 more honey to fill the want of oxygen. Later 

 on they become gorged with the honey. 

 They will not fan or make any attempt what- 

 ever to entice fresh air into the hive, as they 

 do when the temperature is high. There is 

 the sticker with a cold cellar; but where a 

 natural circulation takes place these bees 

 in a cold cellar will fare equally as well as 

 those in a warmer cellar. They die quietly 

 in a cold cellar. 



Last winter my bees had a cold cellar, but 

 they all had deep hive-bottoms with each 

 end open. I never had so few dead bees on 

 a cellar floor, never had so little stores con- 

 sumed, and never had them in a condition 

 these were when I put them out; and the 

 best proof of the job was, I never before had 

 so little spotting up the surroundings with 

 excrements. They were fed principally 

 upon pure air, and I have come to this con- 

 clusion that a bee in a cellar will winter on 

 a drop of honey, providing it has all the pure 

 air it needs. 



One of the foremost effects of an impure 

 atmosphere is a lowering ot the vitality, and 

 thus decreasing the bodily resistance. Dis- 

 eases progress more easily, rapidly and 

 fatally, and have a tendency to spread from 

 animal to animal in an impure atmosphere. 

 You who are fighting foul brood should not 

 forget this. This old ex-miner predicts that 

 you will never clean up that plague until 

 you adopt and take pure air into considera- 

 tion. 



After having had the experience I had 



