1893 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



19 



it is very easily got rid of. It is a very easy 

 animal to catch in a steel trap. It won't make 

 any smudge when it is caught, if there is noth- 

 ing there to scare it. It never uses that dread- 

 ful weapon but in self-defense. When you 

 have got it in a trap, don't scare or fight it: 

 come uptoit carefully and slowly; make friends 

 with it; talk to it; work up slowly; watch its 

 tail. As long as it keeps its tail down there is no 

 danger; but if it raises its tail, step back — there 

 is danger. Don't make any quick motions. 

 Work slowly and carefully. It may take half 

 an hour to get up to it, near enough to move it 

 away or work close by it. You can easily make 

 friends with it. if you don't work or approach 

 it too fast. The trap-chain may be tangled, or 

 wound around something, so that it must be 

 free before you start to move the animal: but 

 by taking a'little time, and being sure not to 

 scare it, the trap-chain can be easily got free; 

 then fasten the trap to a pole of some kind— 10 

 to 15 feet long. Now take hold of the othei- end 

 of the pole and slowly pull it along toward 

 some water deep enough to drown it. If the 

 work is done carefully you won't smell the 

 skunk at all. Bdt perhaps you have not any 

 water-hole near enough to go to. Then, per- 

 haps, the best way is to shoot it. In that case, 

 take a shotgun; put in a good heavy charge; 

 stand about ten feet away; get a side shot; 

 shoot it through the small of the back, as that 

 will paralyze the whole hind parts, and there 

 will be no smell. But that will spoil the skin 

 for fur. A friend of mine has trapped them for 

 the furs, and he carried a knife about four inch- 

 es long and half an inch wide, stuck in the end 

 of a broom-handle. After making friends with 

 the skunk he would stand before it and stick it 

 as you would a pig, when it would bleed to 

 death. Mind, he did not catch the skunk a,nd 

 hold it to stick it, but stuck it standing without 

 being held, except that it was in the trap. 



HOW TO PRESERVE COMBS. 



To preserve combs from the ravages of worms 

 and mice (see Gleanings, Dec. 1, Stray Straws), 

 I have a room in one of my buildings 10x10 feet^ 

 7 feet high, lathed and plastered: one window 

 and door; cellar under the room. Combs put 

 in there in the fall, and frozen during the win- 

 ter, are safe for any length of time. I hang 

 them half an inch apart. In the spring and 

 early summer, if I have combs in our out- 

 apiaries that are beginning to show worms, I 

 bring them home and put them in this same 

 room and smoke them heavy with sulphur. 

 One smoking with me is enough to make a sure 

 job. I have a little sheet-iron stove down cel- 

 lar, in which to burn the sulphur. A four-inch 

 pipe takes the smoke up through the floor into 

 the room. When I have only a few combs, and 

 don't want to make a dense smoke in the whole 

 room, I hang the combs in extra supers, and 

 pile them up over the stovepipe hole in the 

 room; cover them up tight; then smoke them 

 as hard as I please. I never fail to kill every 

 thing in that pile of combs, big worm^ and lit- 

 tle, and eggs — all are killed the first smoke. 



WHERE THE fLfSTEK OF BEES SHOULD BE FOR 

 WINTERING. 



Ill Stray Straws. Dec. 1, Dr. Miller quotes 

 Hasty as saying. " A cluster formed touching 

 the top. and stores below them, is very much 

 safer than a cluster formed away down, and 

 stores above them." I think Hasty is mistaken 

 for outdoor wintering. We winter outdoors 

 several hundred colonies every winter; and at 

 the approach of frosty weather they cluster 

 below the honey. The most of our bees are on 

 frames 21 in. deep. If we raise the honey-board 

 now in December, there will not be a bee to be 

 seen. They are away down below their stores. 



and that is right. Bees clustered above their 

 stores will starve if there is a long cold spell. 

 The heat from the bees rises. The bees can 

 work up but not down in very cold weather. I 

 have over 100 colonies in L. frames. I always 

 winter them on two sets of frames— one set 

 above the other. I want the upper set to be 

 solid full of feed. The lower set must have 

 empty combs enough for the bees to cluster in, 

 for tiie reason that they can not live among 

 full combs of honey in cold weather. They 

 can not keep the honey warm. When bees 

 cluster for a cold snap they crawl into the 

 combs, a bee in every cell; then bees in the 

 spaces between the combs, making a solid ball 

 of bees. In that way they keep warm. They 

 cluster close to the feed, but not among it. Bees 

 will work off sidewise to get feed; but if there 

 is feed above them they will work up, where it 

 is warmer. 



THAT BEE-KEEPERS' UNION. 



Now a few words about the Bee - keepers' 

 Union undertaking the job of putting down 

 adulteration in honey. It Is a big fight. The 

 Union is not strong enough. The Union has 

 done splendid work; but unless we can get a 

 great many more members I don't believe we 

 had better undertake too much. I had rather 

 see another society formed to fight the adulter- 

 ators; then, if we can get enough members in 

 the new society to make any thing of a suc- 

 cessful fight, by a vote of the two societies the 

 two could join in one. But don't spoil the old 

 Union by loading it down with more than it 

 can carry. E. France & Son. 



Platteville, Wis., Dec. U. 



[Your experience with regard to the proper 

 location of a cluster of bees for outdoor winter- 

 ing is exactly ours. We don't remember that 

 we ever lost a colony when the cluster was be- 

 low the honey — so far down as to make the hive 

 appear almost empty when the packing materi- 

 al was removed from the top; but we have lost 

 them when the bees were on top of the honey. 

 —With regatd to skunks, we have never had 

 experience either to corroborate or disprove 

 that of Mr. France. The most of us will have 

 to accept his instructions, without argument. — 

 With regard to the Bee-keepers' Union, we feel 

 that an association that is protective ought also 

 to prosecute adulterators, as well as defend 

 bee-keepi'rs from unjust accusations of ignorant 

 neighbors. One that has both functions will 

 secure a larger membership than a union hav- 

 ing either one of the powers alone. It is a large 

 membership we want and must have.] 



A BACHELOR'S PROTEST. 



ONE OF rambler's Vlf'TIMS; A MATRIMONIAL 

 BUREAU FOR CALIFORNIA "•BACHES."' 



Mr. Editor:— Lei this thing stop right here. 

 Do put a muzzle on the Rambler. He is not 

 only •• unraveling '■ himself, but he is undoing, 

 or. rather, "doing up." the rest of us bachelors 

 in a manner truly scandalous. When he came 

 among us. something liki-ayear ago.no one 

 suspected his true character or thought to look 

 and see whether he had cloven hoofs. We saw 

 in him only a nondescript individual of roving 

 tendencies— a traveling bee-monger, a wander- 

 ing Kodak fiend, in station rather above the 

 ordinary tramp or "blanket man." yet consid- 

 erably lower than the angels. He was a 

 stranger, and. after t\u> manner of the country, 

 we thought to "take him in.'" But he proved 

 to be foxy, this planet (or sliall we say comet?) 

 in the apiarian system, and. instead of paying 



