1910 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



225 



pull up stakes where previously located. 

 Then when once here, as a bee-keeper of 

 this great State, the new comer should make 

 up his mind that he is going to like the new 

 place and the new State. We want no people 

 here who are always dissatisfied, no matter 

 where they are nor what their lot is. There 

 are such that are always grumbling about 

 their surroundings. We do not need them. 

 But the real, energetic, interested hustler 

 has a chance, if he will try things and stick 

 to it. It must be remembered that we have 

 adverse seasons here sometimes as well as 

 elsewhere; however, these have been com- 

 paratively few, and, taking year for year, 

 our seasons have been above the average as 

 compared to other parts of the country. Tak- 

 ing it all in all, Texas bee-keeping has a bril- 

 liant future. All we have to do it to stick to 

 our business, improve as we go along, and 

 our efforts will not be in vain. 

 New Braunfels, Texas. 



COMB VS. EXTRACTED HONEY. 



Comparative Results of Comb and Extract- 

 ed Honey Production in the Buckwheat 

 Regions of Eastern New York; Buck- 

 wheat as a Honey-plant. 



BY FRED G. MASON. 



My father began bee keeping in 1864, and 

 continued in the business to the time of his 

 death, in 1898, leaving me at that time with 

 84 colonies in winter quarters. I was brought 

 up in the business, and often helped him 

 when not otherwise employed. I read the 

 bee-journals from early boyhood. Hearing 

 of E. W. Alexander and his large apiary in 

 New York I became very much interested, 

 and finally managed to spend ten days help- 

 ing him during the busy season. This was 

 a most profitable and pleasant experience, 

 and I will long remember Mr. Alexander's 

 kindness to me in answering questions and 

 giving me the benefit of his experience and 

 advice. 



It was due in a great measure to Mr. Frank 

 Alexander that I was placed in sole charge 

 of a good-sized apiary in the buckwheat 

 country last season. The 226 colonies in this 

 yard had gone into winter quarters in the 

 fall of 1908 in very good condition by reason 

 of a continuous light flow from buckwheat, 

 which kept the bees rearing brood long past 

 the usual time (a condition that was quite 

 reversed last fall). The bees were taken 

 out of the cellar April 2 and 3, 1909, and had 

 a fair flight. By the middle of May the api- 

 ary consisted of about 210 colonies which 

 had survived the severest spring weather 

 that I can recall. As soon as fruit-bloom 

 came, weather permitting, I began overhaul- 

 ing the bees, equahzing stores, clipping 

 queens, etc. I soon noticed that most of the 

 noney in the hives was candied as hard as a 

 board, the bees using it of necessity rather 

 than of choice. I reasoned that, as soon as 

 they could obtain new honey in a sufficient 



amount to keep up brood-rearing, they would 

 no longer touch this old honey, and it would 

 be in the way, in many cases, enough to cur- 

 tail brood-rearing sadly. Therefore, as soon 

 as the bees were bringing in new honey suf- 

 ficiently I began removing this candied hon- 

 ey, substituting the best breeding-combs 

 that I could select from the stock of extract- 

 ing-combs, always leaving a frame or two of 

 the candied honey for outside frames. I usu- 

 ally selected the lighter combs to remove, 

 for fear that weather conditions might pre- 

 vent a continued supply of new honey. 



On my second trip over the yard I found 

 quite a number of colonies that had almost 

 reached their limit in brood-rearing, and to 

 such colonies I gave a second story contain- 

 ing the best of the empty brood-combs with 

 a comb of candied honey, from which the 

 cappings were removed, next to each side 

 wall. Soon there were great slabs of brood 

 in those second stories, and the bees were 

 bringing in clover honey quite freely. I soon 

 reduced the colonies to one story each, help- 

 ing out the weaker ones with sealed brood 

 from the stronger ones, and forming new 

 colonies with extra combs of brood not re- 

 quired for this purpose. These new colonies 

 were, for the most part, supplied with lay- 

 ing queens. This apiary was equipped for 

 both comb and extracted honey, and I was 

 obliged to run for both, even though I al- 

 ready had a preference. The prospects for 

 next season ivere good, sweet clover being 

 quite abundant, and many fields of alsike 

 giving promise of full bloom. Basswood, 

 moreover, was plentiful and the trees were 

 a sight to behold, being weighted down with 

 buds the like of which I had never seen be- 

 fore. 



In placing comb and extracting- supers on 

 the hives I was very careful to pick out the 

 most powerful colonies for the comb-honey 

 supers, leaving the rest for the extracting 

 supers, and after finishing this work I found 

 that the comb-honey colonies outnumbered 

 the others. I had plenty of bait-sections, so 

 I usually used ten in each super, five of 

 them being sections that had perhaps been 

 worked on a little, the other five being quite 

 well drawn out. 



The white honey- flow did not prove to be 

 as great as I expected, for, with the excep- 

 tion of a few days, the weather was anything 

 but ideal. The nights were very cold, and 

 the days were nearly always cool and often 

 windy. Along in April the bees did not usu- 

 ally go to the fields until the morning was 

 well advanced, and by three o'clock work 

 was almost at a standstill because of the 

 cold. Notwithstanding these adverse con- 

 ditions I secured what many would call a 

 fair crop of white honey, and removed both 

 the comb and extracted honey before the 

 bees made much headway on buckwheat. 

 At least 90 per cent of the extracted honey 

 was sealed when removed I soon had emp- 

 ty supers in place ready for the buckwheat 

 crop. 



I was very much surprised when I came 

 to compare the results of the comb and ex- 



