1895 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



699 



will not the white and red varieties bloom at 

 different dates?" So far I can give no satisfac- 

 tory information on this point. Both appear 

 to bloom at the same season. The plant musi 

 be started the year (autumn) before; and, 

 whether sown earlier or later, the timg for 

 blooming is at the same period. 



By far the best way is to work for a succes- 

 sion, as I have already shown, with different 

 plants, which are all at their best in their own 

 respective seasons, plowing under the last crop 

 of melilot as the bloom fails. 



In the ordinary way, the farmer sows over 

 wheat, oats, etc., after cutting and carrying 

 those crops (August to September), without 

 cultivating, and therefore, of course, on pretty 

 solid ground, and very little is needed besides 

 rolling the following spring. A thin ciop of 

 trifolium is seldom seen. My directions, how- 

 ever, refer to cultivation for bees and forage. 

 The buckwheat, of course, is always a valuable 

 crop for its seed. 



Seaford, England. 



THE WEIGHT OF BEES, LOADED AND EMPTY. 



THE MOST ACCURATK FIGURES YET GIVEN. 



By Prof. B. F. Koom. 



Friend Root: — Some two years ago, in a lei- 

 sure hour J went to my apiary and captured one 

 outgoing bee from each hive and subjected 

 them to the fumes of cyanide of potassium for a 

 few moments to render them inactive, and then 

 weighed each bee upon our chemical balances — a 

 pair of scales so delicately adjusted that it is an 

 easy matter to weigh the one-millionth part of a 

 pound or the one-thousandth part of a bee. 

 From the weight of each separate bee it was a 

 very simple problem in arithmetic to compute 

 the number of bees in a pound. The results 

 showed that mine, which perhaps are a fair av- 

 erage in size and weight, ran from 4141 to 5669 

 in a pound. These results you published in 

 Gleanikgs, and there expressed a wish that 1 

 would also determine the amount of honey car- 

 ried by a homing bee. In my research for the 

 weight of bees I took those just leaving the 

 hive, which naturally would represent the nor- 

 mal weight, having no extra honey or pollen 

 on board. 



During the present summer, when the bees 

 were very active, I have undertaken to carry 

 out your request as lu the amount of honey car- 

 ried by a bee. My nuthod was this: From the 

 chemical laboratory 1 secured a couple of deli- 

 cate glass flasks with corks, marking them A 

 and B. Each was v( ly carefully weighed, and 

 the weight recorded. 1 then went to a hive, 

 and, with the aid of ;: pair of delicate pliers, or 

 pincers, 1 captured a lumber of incoming bees 

 and dropped them into flask A. I then secured 

 about an equal number of outgoing bees in flask 



B. These were then taken to the laboratory 

 immediately, and each flask again weighed, 

 after which the bees were carefully counted and 

 released. This operation was repeated quite a 

 number of times, not on the same day, but as 

 opportunity ofl'ered, and when the bees were 

 bringing in an abundance of honey. I captured 

 from 30 to 45 bees for each flask at each trip, 

 aiming to have, as nearly as might be, the same 

 number in each flask on any particular trip. I 

 always weighed the flasks before starting out, 

 lest some little bit of soil or stain, or even mois- 

 ture on the glass, would render the results less 

 accurate ; I also always allowed any moisture 

 condensed upon the inside of the flasks, while 

 the bees were confined, to evaporate before 

 weighing for another trip. I then treated my 

 lesults as follows: From the weight of flask 

 and bees 1 deducted the weight of the flask ; 

 the remainder 1 di video by the number of bees 

 conrtned on that trip. This gave me the aver- 

 age weight of the bees captured at that time. 

 The average weight of the bees in flask A, or 

 loaded bees, was always greater, as it should 

 be, than the average weight of the bees in flask 

 B, or unloaded bees. The difference between 

 these two weights gave me the average amount 

 of honey carried by that lot of bees. 



Mine are Italian and hybrid bees, but I made 

 no attempt to aetermine the ditt'erence in the 

 amount carried by the ditt'erent swarms or 

 breeds. 1 kept no record of the swarms, except 

 that 1 guarded against going to the same hive 

 lor a second lot of bees. A considerable differ- 

 ence does appear, but probably that arises in 

 part from the abundance or scarcity of the 

 honey on that particular day on which the col- 

 ony was visited. My aim was to secure relia- 

 ble results, as nearly as possible, representing 

 the average amount of honey carried by bees. 



The following is the result of weighing sever- 

 al hundred each, of the returning and outgoing 

 bees. The smallest number of bees necessary to 

 carry one pound of honey, as shown by my re- 

 sults, is 10,154; or, in other words, one bee can 

 carry the xoisi (one ten thousand one hundred 

 and Hfty-lourth) part of a pound of honey; and 

 the largest number, as shown by the results, re- 

 quired to carry a pound is 45,642; and the aver- 

 age of all the sets weighed is 2o,167. Perhaps, 

 then, it is approximately correct to say that the 

 average load of a bee is .,^1,35 (one twenty-thou- 

 sandth) of a pound; or, in other words, if a col- 

 ony has 20,000 bees in it, and each makes one 

 trip a day, they will add one pound to their 

 stores. Of course, not all the bees in a colony 

 leave the hive, the nurses remaining at home, 

 hence necessitating more trips of those which 

 do "go a-field." 



I also repeated my observations of two years 

 ago on the weight of bees, and found that my 

 numbers ran from 3680 to 5495 in a pound, and 

 the average about 4800, the same as in my for- 



