1910 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



511 



Stray Straws 



By Dr. C. C. Miller, Marengo, 111. 



The shut-down of clover, July 10, was 

 for keeps, leaving only half the crop I ex- 

 pected. Drouth here is terrible, although 

 it rains all about. 



BiENEN-vATER, p. 166, gives a picture of 

 "An American Apiary in Hungary." It 

 belongs to Karl R. Mathey, formerly a so- 

 journer at Medina, and special mention is 

 made that from a single Langstroth hive he 

 harvested 286 pounds of honey — presumably 

 extracted. 



If foundation can be profitably dispens- 

 ed with at any time, one would supi^ose it 

 would be in i^roducing bulk honey. But 

 Louis Scholl says, American Bee Journal, 

 188, that he has learned that it j^ays big " to 

 use full sheets of foundation at all times, 

 both in supers and brood-chambers." 



It has been said that, in a state of na- 

 ture, bees always build comb with an angle 

 of the cells pointing downward. Two writ- 

 ers, Leipz. Bzig., 95, dispute this. One very 

 tleep comb started with cells horizontal at 

 bottom, changing after a time to cells with 

 angle at bottom, and further down chang- 

 ing the second time. [I suppose you mean 

 by the cells "pointing downward," slanting 

 downward from the outside of the cell to the 

 base. — Ed.] 



Fr. Lei'Enberger, Schiv. Bzig., 143, says 

 in substance, "In America and elsewhere 

 Italians are said to be least susceptible to 

 foul brood. .lust the contrary is shown by 

 our statistics. South Switzerland, where 

 Italians are native, is precisely where foul 

 brood is most devastating." Which agrees 

 with what I said. Blacks more vigorous 

 than Italians in Switzerland, hence more 

 immune; Italians more vigorous in Ameri- 

 ca, hence more immune. 



Editor Hutchinson says "that in in- 

 troducing queens we can entirely disregard 

 odor as a factor in the problem." The fact 

 that in some cases we may introduce a queen 

 directly is not satisfactory proof that odor 

 cuts no figure. In general, time is an im- 

 portant factor in introducing, and what 

 bearing has time except with regard to odor? 

 Yet in those cases where a queen is intro- 

 duced without any time being taken, one 

 can hardly dispute that "we entirely disre- 

 gard odor." 



The one thing especially to look for when 

 trying to spot European foul brood is the 

 yellowish larva curled up in the bottom of 

 the cell. As Dr. Phillips has suggested, 

 "black brood" is a misnomer, "yellow" 

 being more appropriate. Considering this, 

 considering the inconvenient length of the 

 names "American foul brood " and "Eluro- 

 pean foul brood," and considering the con- 



fusion from calling both diseases "foul 

 brood," why not call the European kind 

 "yellow brood " and the other kind just 

 "foul brood " ? [See editorials. — Ed.] 



I WONDER how many still use wooden 

 sticks to wedge sections in supers. The 

 more I use super-springs the better I like 

 them, and wouldn't go back to the stick- 

 wedges if I had to pay three prices for the 

 springs. I find that one spring to the super 

 works well. It is so much easier to put in 

 the springs, and so much easier to take 

 them out; and they're on their job all the 

 time, never letting go as the sticks some- 

 times do. There's another item, which 

 alone would make me use springs. The 

 sticks form a pocket in w^hich a lot of bees 

 get, and it is almost impossible to dislodge 

 them when one is taking off supers. The 

 springs form no such pocket. 



That hive-tool that grows at Medina is 

 a good tool. The bend at one end serves 

 fairly well as a hook to lift out a dummy, 

 although I don't like the straight edge at 

 the other end so well as a curved edge for 

 prying up supers or covers. [The great ma- 

 jority of bee-keepers would not like the 

 rounding end of a tool as well as the way it 

 is, and that is square. A rounding end is 

 better for prying hives apart, but is not sat- 

 isfactory for scraping — especially for scrap- 

 ing up in the corners; but you say the other, 

 or hoe end, will do that better. Yes and no. 

 It is our opinion that both ends should be 

 suitable for scraping, on the principle that 

 there are many men of many notipns. — Ed.] 



"During the blossoming period there are 

 so many blossoms that the bees do not go 

 far from the hives, so we need hives all over 

 the orchards," p. 438. I wonder! If a square 

 mile of orchard has 100 colonies planted at 

 the center, will not the fertilization be just 

 as well done as if the 100 colonies were scat- 

 tered all over the square mile? [From all 

 the evidence in hand, and from some obser- 

 vation on this jiarticular point, we believe 

 we are correct when we say that the 100 col- 

 onies located in the center of a square mile 

 of orchard would not do as good work in 

 fertilization as if the colonies were scattered. 

 We are convinced of this: That in the height 

 of a strong flow bees do not go much more 

 than a quarter of a mile. As the flow be- 

 comes lighter they go further; and when it 

 ends up they may go two or three miles. 

 Taking into consideration that there are 

 likely to be only three or four good flying 

 days in a fruit-blooming season, the infer- 

 ence is fairly drawn that those trees nearest 

 to the bees will be pollinated better than 

 those half a mile away. Moreover, bee-keep- 

 ers can learn something from their fruit- 

 growing neighbors. Some of them now say 

 that a bee-yard half a mile from an orchard 

 does not begin to do as good work as a few 

 bees right in the orchard. Perhaps ten col- 

 onies would be sufficient in an ordinary 

 farm orchard. In that case the maximum 

 flight would not be more than an eighth of 

 a mile. — Ed.] 



