1890 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



593 



iie-inch eUipe bent out at ii?ht angles from the 

 top-bar, that side of the bar at that end can not 

 get closer than ^g inch to its neighbor, and the 

 other end on the ojtposite side of the same. Now, 

 as each frame is similarly arranged, also the hive, 

 then the frames must stay just ?? inch apart until 

 you wish to remove any of them, when all you have 

 to do is to take bold of the spacer at the folded end, 

 and raise it up, using the tack as a pivot; thus your 

 frames can be moved almost as closely as if no at- 

 tachment were present. You see, you can have 

 frames spaced properly, and held for moving, or 

 you can loosen the frames for miinipuliiting, at will, 

 (arbondale, Kan. J. H. Makkley. 



Thanks ; but I hardly think that our bee- 

 keeping friends would tolerate your device. 

 The tins would take too much time to 

 manipulate. 



EARLY EXTRACTING IN CALIFORNIA. 



EXPERIMENTS WITH THE DIBBERN BEE-ESCAPE. 



The following article from L. E. Mercer 

 was overlooked, as it came with an order 

 for goods. Though it is a little late we are 

 glad to give place to it now. 



We commenced extracting the first of May, two 

 weeks earlier than we ever did before since I have 

 been in California. Honey is coming in quite freely 

 for so early in the season. Our scale hive gathered 

 10 lbs. on the -oth day of May. On the 3d we ex- 

 tracted 56K lbs. from it, all new honey. We have 

 about 5(100 sections on and nearly finished. Honey 

 is of a much finer quality than I ever saw before, 

 either here or in the East. Several sample bottles 

 of it are on the table before me that I would say 

 were empty bottles if I had not seen my wife fill 

 them with honey. I will send you one of them, and, 

 if you want it, several tons of the same kind. 



Mr. Dibbern sent me two of his bee-escapes some 

 time ago. We have experimented considerably 

 with them, but they will not work for extracting. 

 They get full of bees, especially drones, that seem 

 to be lost, and the bees will not go through them. 

 They worked well three or four weeks ago, before 

 the hives were so full of bees. The drones seem to 

 cause most of the trouble, but I have just received 

 two more escapes from Mr. Dibbern that T think 

 will work better, as they are only single, while the 

 first were double; and the bees, especially the 

 drones, would get lost between the two wires, and 

 would fill up the space so full that they could not 

 move one way or the other to find their way out. 



You know, of course, that we have three kinds of 

 sage here, — the black, that blooms first; then the 

 purple, that nearly all of our honey is gathered 

 from; and then comes the white sage, that, judging 

 from the way nearly all honey-tables in California 

 read, produces about all the honey here, but which, 

 in fact, produces less than either black or purple 

 sage. The sample I send is all from black sage, 

 which always produces the whitest honey. The 

 honey-flow is good at present, but the crop must 

 surely be a light one, as we have had no spring- 

 rains. Although we had an abundance of rain in 

 the winter, j et the honey crop is largely dependent 

 on the late spring rains. L. E. Mercer. 



San Buena Ventura, Cal., May 7. 



The sample of honey from black sage is, I 

 think, the finest we ever saw in appearance, 



and certainly nothing can excel it in llavor. 

 It is certainly true, as friend Mercer says, 

 if the bottle were filled it would be a very 

 difficult matter to tell whether it contained 

 something or not, without taking it up. 

 Notwithstanding its perfect transparency, 

 it is so thick that it hardly runs in warm 

 weather. It seems to me that this honey 

 should bring an extra price, for it is " gilt 

 " if there is any gilt edge in the world. 



FIRST HONEY IN THE HIVE OR SEC- 

 TIONS ; "WHICH? 



THE IMPORTANCE OF HAVING THE LOWER STORY 



CONTRACTED, AND FILLED WITH BROOD 



.IDST BEFORE THE HARVEST. 



Mr. Editor:— My attention has been called to your 

 reply to question four, as asked by Mr. Naftel, on 

 page 341. You there say, " Bees will be pretty apt, 

 especially the Italians, to fill the brood-chamber 

 first, no matter what the honey is; after that they 

 will go into the supers if the colony is strong 

 enough and there is a good flow of nectar. As a 

 general rule, there will or ought to be enough in- 

 ferior honey in the brood-nest to cause the first 

 white honey to go above." Now, I seriously object 

 to both these views, for on them hang all there is 

 against the use of large hives for comb honey, as 

 recommended by our fathers, and even by some oi' 

 the present day, as opposing the contraction plau 

 as recommended by myself and others, which to- 

 day stands out prominently. No, sir! the bees 

 must not fill the brood-chamber first with honey, 

 and the sections afterward, Italian or otherwise, if 

 we are to reap the best results from our bees. At 

 the time the honey-flow commences, the brood- 

 chamber must be filled with brood, with not to ex- 

 ceed five pounds of honey in it, and niw pound will 

 be far better than the five. If it is not thus filled 

 with brood, the wise apiarist will take out all the 

 combs not thus filled, and store them away where 

 the bees can not have access to them at this time of 

 the year: for if they once commence to store honey 

 in the combs below, to any considerable extent, 

 thus early in the season, instead of going into the 

 boxes they will begin to crowd the queen with hon- 

 ey to a greater or lesser extent, thus removing the 

 boxes further and further from the brood, till at 

 last there will be little brood in the hive, little hon- 

 ey in the boxes, and the colony in very poor shape 

 for winter on account of the fewness of the bees 

 left, owing to this same crowding-out of the queen 

 from the brood-combs. The work of every bee- 

 keeper should be, during the fore part of the sea- 

 son, to see that his combs are being rapidly filled 

 with brood, and all that inferior honey spoken of 

 used up and turned into brood which is to make the 

 bees for the harvest, till the hive is literally filled with 

 brood; when, if there is a pound of honey comes 

 in after this, it must go into the sections or no, 

 where. Here is the rock on which those favoring 

 the Italians and those opposing them as comb-hon- 

 ey gatherers split; for, if managed as given in yoiir 

 editorial, the Italians will be unprofitable every 

 time; while, if managed as I propose, they will 

 outyield the blacks as to honey every time; 

 while at the end of the season they will have 

 honey enough in their brood-combs for winter- 

 when Ihe black bees will be almost in a starving 



