1910 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



64-; 



Bee-keeping in the South- 

 west 



By LOUIS ScHOLL, New Braunlels, Texas 



scholl's method of removing honey. 

 For years we have not owned a bee-brush 

 of any kind, removing tons of honey with- 

 out brushing a single comb. We feel that 

 this is the most practical way, and a time- 

 saver as well as a money-saver. While vis- 

 iting one of our progressi^■e bee-keepers in 

 Southwest Texas, ]NIr. Louis Biediger, at 

 Atascosa, we had occasion to show him the 

 advantages of our way of removing the hon- 

 ey, and he recently wrote us as follows in 

 regard to it: 



I wish to thank you for the valuable hints which 

 I learned from you during your recent visits at my 

 home. I have tried your way of taking off honey, 

 on five separate occasions, and I must say that I do 

 not brush the bees oflf the combs any more. Al- 

 though I can probably not work this " super-jerk- 

 ing" quite as fast as you can, still I can do it fast 

 enough to have the honey on the wagon and out of 

 the way before the bees start to robbing, and this 

 is something I never could do when taking off hon- 

 ey the old way or even by the Coggshall fashion. 



Our way is simply to use shallow ideal su- 

 pers throughout, as we have advocated for 

 years; and when these are filled it is an easy 

 matter to smoke the bees down, or most of 

 them, and then shake out the rest while the 

 sujiers are rapidly handled and brought to 

 the wagon. They are then loaded and cov- 

 ered up bee-tight to prevent robbing. We 

 begin with one hive, taking ofT the cover 

 quickly with the left hand, then blowing in 

 smoke to run the bees down. In the mean- 

 while, with the left hand we remove the 

 cover from the next hive, each time throw- 

 ing it in front of its respective hive, so that 

 the bees can crawl back. Smoke is then 

 blown into the second hive while the cover 

 of the third hive is taken off, and so on un- 

 til five hives standing in a group are all 

 open, and the bees sent scrambling below 

 out of the way. Then we return quickly to 

 the first hive, give it a few more puffs of 

 smoke, then the second, and so on, until all 

 have had the second smoking. When this 

 is done, the supers are ready to be jerked off 

 and leaned against the front of the hives at 

 one side so the rest of the bees may crawl 

 out. 



The next or second round of supers is even 

 more quickly removed, since the bees in 

 them are already scrambling downward 

 from the smoking received from the first su- 

 pers removed. We can remove honey fast- 

 er this way than by any other plan, not ex- 

 cepting the bee-escape method, since we can 

 take the honey off in about the same time 

 that bee-escapes could be put on. Then, be- 

 sides, bee-escapes are out of the question at 

 outyards many of which are over twenty 

 miles away. In the time that would be re- 

 quired by an extra trip to put on escape- 

 boards, we take off the honey and get start- 

 ed home with it before the bees are hardly 

 aware of what has happened. 



WHAT KIND OF PAINT TO USE ON BEE- 

 HIVES. 



We have always been a firm advocate of 

 painting hives, as the readers know. Others 

 have been writing on the sitbject, and sev- 

 eral have mentioned the kind of paint to 

 use. On page 576 the editor endorses the 

 use of pure lead and oil only, in ^ireference 

 to lead and zinc paint, claiming that, be- 

 cause the lead-and-oil paint without zinc 

 ^'oes not become hard and firm, it chalks 

 off readily so that the surface can be r.' paint- 

 ed to look as good as new, whereas lead-and- 

 zinc paint flakes off in scales, leaving a 

 rough surface to be repainted. 



Although this is true, we do not like the 

 lead and oil without zinc, just for the rea- 

 sons mentioned. It does not hold on well 

 enough, and it chalks off so quickly that it 

 must soon be repainted. If zin:* be added, 

 the paint has a harder surface, holds on bet- 

 ter and longer, hence is more durable and 

 satisfactory, beside being less expensive, it 

 is true that, if too much zinc is used, the 

 paint before long peels off; but this is a 

 mistake, for the zinc should be used only in 

 the right proportion to give good results. 

 We have tried all kinds of paint, and ap- 

 plied it in many different ways; but the 

 best results that we have obtained have 

 been with a good well-mixed lead, zinc, and 

 oil paint. The best way of applying this 

 to give the most satisfactory results is to 

 have the first coat thin, spread on well, and 

 not too thick. This should be on at least 

 six months or a year before the second coat 

 is applied. After waiting this long, two 

 more good coats are given, and for durabili- 

 ty we know of no better method of procedure. 



BEE-STINGS AND RHEUMATISM. 



This is an old worn-out subject with some; 

 but to others it is entirely new. I am still 

 of the opinion that there are two sides to 

 this much - discussed question. This is 

 brought out by some of my own experience 

 in the first place, and by that of others in 

 the second. Then when some of our best 

 physicians tell me that "it seems reasona- 

 ble enough that there may be something in 

 it," although they have not made an appli- 

 cation themselves, we begin to wonder 

 where we are at. Right in this line our 

 family physician gave me the following 

 clipping as coming from an authority : 



Maberly reports ^-evsral cases of chronic (appar- 

 ently intractable) cases of rheumatism which were 

 cured to all intents and purposes by being exposed 

 to bee-stings at regular intervals. One, a man 

 about 35 years of age, had been laid up three times 

 with rheumatic fever for six or seven months each 

 time, and found his joints increasingly stiff with 

 each attacr In his case the stings did marvels. 

 His feet r. d aiways been stiff from the first attack, 

 but ncv he could walk anywhere, and " did " about 

 twL i; m les every Sunday. His ankle movements 

 ACi ^ periect, and he stood on his toes quite easily. 

 He says that he always ate and drank what he 

 liked, and whenever he could catch a bee in his 

 garden he did so and put it on. Maberly saw a 

 number of other cases, some of old-standing chron- 

 ic rheumatism, both in elderly and younger sub- 

 jects, and all were doing well; while, in nearly all, 

 the usual remedies had been tried without any 

 good results.— ^m. Med. Ass'n Journal, Aug. 20, 1910. 



