August, 1918 



Q L K A N T N G S IN 13 E E C V L T U K K 



475 



it is a hcij) to take it each time tliere is an 

 inclination to cough, and it may bo worth 

 while to give it a fair trial. Pretty much 

 all cough medicines have in them either 

 some preparation of opium or else something 

 to nauseate you, and too much of that sort 

 of thing is not so very desirable. Just 

 possibly, in a good many cases, honey maj^ 

 do the business without the things objec- 

 tionable. 



# * » 



The views of Jay Smith and Mel Prit- 

 chard , page 406, and of Mrs. Allen, page 

 414, as to the behavior of queens, are inter- 

 esting. It 's a little hard to believe that 

 queens and workers are not both governed 

 by the same rules. I've had an idea that in 

 locating a hive they were governed by form 

 rather than color. Yet a good many times 

 I have seen bees flying in front of their 

 hives in a confused way, as if having a 

 playspell or preparing to swarm, and only 

 because the entrance, all the rest of the day 

 in the shade, was for a few minutes in the 

 sun. That looks as if they paid attention 

 to color. Here's pretty strong evidence 

 that form is the chief thing: Let hives be 

 placed in a straight row six feet or more 

 apart, with no trees or other objects to help 

 mark location, and there is some danger of 

 getting into wrong hives. Let two nuclei 

 be in the same hive, with a front entrance 

 divided between them, and there is no dan- 

 ger as to confusion of the entrances. They 

 are safer at six inches apart than are the 

 entrances six feet apart in the straight row 

 of hives, because the bees go by form, and 

 don 't mistake right for left, or vice versa. 

 Mrs. Allen, I don 't know for sure, but I 've 

 some idea that a young queen takes its first 

 flight on the first day it marks its location, 

 and also does some marking each time it 

 takes a flight. Like you, I have been care- 

 ful not to change the jslace of a young queen 

 from four to eight days old, "lest I muddle 

 her geography with disastrous results. ' ' 



* * * 



J. E. Crane, you say, page 411, that you 

 have no fall flow from which to secure 

 combs of sealed honey for spring feeding, 

 and, if you secure such combs, it must be 

 by the middle of July to the first of August. 

 Well, such combs w^ill answer very well; but 

 since you prefer to use sugar, seeing it 's 

 you, I give you my permission to do so. 

 At the same time, I wonder whether in the 

 long run it may not be cheaper to use the 

 early honey. Isn 't it just possible that the 

 vitamines and minerals found in honey, and 

 not at all in sugar, may give such stamina 

 to the bees as to make them store enotigh 

 extra to make up the difference and more? 



"Helpmeet," page 400, speaking of 

 combs of brood piled up eight stories high, 

 says: "Later, after considerable of this 

 brood has emerged, some of the hive bodies 

 are slipped forward or back to allow addi- 

 tional entrances." T hardly think "Help- 



meet" means that these openings are used 

 by the bees as places of exit or entrance, 

 but valuable for ventilation. In about all 

 of my beekeeping life it has been my prac- 

 tice to make openings for ventilation at one 

 or more points above the brood-chamber, 

 and it is a curious fact that in not one case 

 out of a hundred do the bees use these open- 

 ings for entrances, no matter how conven- 

 ient it might seem. Having established an 

 entrance at a particular place, they seem to 

 think that one entrance is enough. 



* » * 



Bees by parcel postl That's a big thing 

 for short distances, and possibly for long. 

 How will it compare as to the matter of cost 

 with sending by express from the South f 

 [In the fifth zone for instance, the parcels 

 post is cheaper up to 15 pounds — very much 

 cheaper on small packages; over 15 pounds, 

 express is cheaper. In the fourth zone, the 

 advantage lies with parcels post up to 25 

 pounds, and this advantage is still greater 

 in the first, second, and third zones. The 

 nearer the zone, the cheaper is parcels post 

 as compared with express, and vice versa. — 

 Editor.] ^ , , 



Poor Bud Tomlinson! page 402. He's 

 not likely again to want to carry honey in 

 his trunk, but if he should want to do so, I 

 can tell him how I did it, simply doing it up 

 in paper, just like so much dry sugar. I 

 laid the vessel of candied honey on its side 

 and left it till all the liquid had drained 

 out. Then I did it up in paper and put it 

 in my trunk. But it will not work with all 

 honey. Some honey of fine grain cannot be 

 thus drained; it wdll either all run out or 



else not at all. 



* * * 



G. M. Uoolitle was one of a thousand 

 among beekeepers; a clear thinker, a care- 

 ful experimenter, a successful beekeeper, 

 and a lucid writer. But more than all this 

 was the character of the man as a man, al- 

 ways standing for what he believed to be 

 right and true, no matter whether it was 

 popular or unpopular. A good man has gone 



to his reward. 



* * * 



When a colony has queen-cells after 

 swarming, you say on page 427, "If one de- 

 sires to improve the strain, all these cells 

 may be torn out and another queen intro- 

 duced or a capped cell (in a protector) 

 given them. ' ' Is there really any need of 



the protector? 



* * * 



"It is admitted by our best beekeepers 

 that bees, even during a severe winter, will 

 do better on sugar stores, ' ' page 394. Isn 't 

 there a sort of all-inclusiveness about that 

 that is hardly warranted? Don't some pre- 

 fer good honey? 



* * * 



Our bad drought was at last broken by 

 a pretty good rain June 30, in time, let us 

 hope, to save from drying up the bounteous 

 spread of white clover. 



