810 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Nov. 15. 



consideration locality. This point was ('mi)lia- 

 sized by Mr. W. F. Clarke. Mi's. Harrison, in 

 crossing the Mississippi, had discovered hun- 

 dreds of acres of Spanish needle, and the bees 

 were just rolling in the honey. 



BUTTON-BALL. 



Mr. S. A. Shuck had no Spanish-needle, but 

 button-ball honey. It conies in bloom with 

 him about the 5th of July. It is of good color, 

 and yields a good quantity. Under favorable 

 circumstances he had secured 7 lbs. per day per 

 colony for eight days. 



THp; CHAPMAN HONEY-PLANT. 



i^ A. I. Root related tiiat Prof. Cook had tried it 

 on an extensive scale, and that he (Cook) had 

 concluded that it was not a pjotitable bee-forage 

 for cultivation. Mr. Axtell had tried it, and it 

 yielded honey, but he did not think it paid. 



QUESTION-BOX. 



On the evening of the first day the question- 

 box was opened again. The question, "Can 

 poultry-keeping and bee-keeping be profitably 

 combined?" Dr. Miller was called upon to 

 answer. He said he did not know very much 

 about it. but he would read a letter "from a 

 friend, on the subject. All the reporters, an- 

 ticipating something solid and serious, grabbed 

 their pencils and began jotting lively. Very 

 seriously and innocently he read Sockerie's ex- 

 perience with a sitting hen. Very soon the 

 reporters and the rest began to " catch on " to 

 the hoax, when they perceived that it was a 

 side-splitting impersonation rather than a seri- 

 ous detail of facts. Those of you who have had 

 the pleasure of hearing the doctor deliver some 

 of his comic pieces, can get s<imetliin«' of an idea 

 of the fun we had. Stripping the little story of 

 its German brogue and its funny hits, a certain 

 Dutchman, not very big up and down, but big 

 all around, proceeded to set an old hen in the 

 barn-loft. He could not reach up to the hen's 

 nest with a hatful of eggs in his arm, so he stood 

 upon a barrel. Perhaps you know the rest. 

 The head of the barrel gave way, and his fat 

 sides telescoped into the barrel, but the nails 

 sticking out prevented his wife from pulling 

 liim out. I do not know, but perhaps we had 

 better give the whole chicken story at a future 

 date, so the doctor will please present it to our 

 readers. 



Another question was, how to get rid of black 

 ants in the apiary. Pour coal oil, coal tar, or 

 diluted carbolic acid on their nests. 



My note-book does not record very many 

 things said and done at this stage of the con- 

 vention. I presume I got tired, or, what is more 

 probable, there was so much fun that the pen- 

 cil could not properly record it. 



THE "don't knows" OF BEE-KEEPING. 



The next morning we listened to a spicy and 

 well-written essay — in fact, a modcil for bee- 

 conventions, from Dr. C. C. Miller, entitled, 

 " What I Don't Know about Bee-keeping." He 

 did not know how far to space combs; whether 

 there is greatci' or less loss from wintering in- 

 doors or outdoors; whether poor seasons are 

 valuable to bee-keepers or not; how to prevent 

 brace-combs; whether fixed frames are practi- 

 cal or not, and how to prevent swarming; and, 

 " ' I don't know ' — but I had better stop." And 

 he closed with a heary applause. His "don't 

 knows " set us to thinking. When a practical 

 chord is touched, how a convention will respond ! 

 The doctor touched a number of practical 

 chords, and the one singled out in particular 

 was very suggestive. 



HOW FAR TO SPACE COMBS. 



It was argued that Nature spaces them about 

 1)4 inches. But the opinion seemed to prevail, 



that, because Nature does so, it is no reason 

 wiiy t)e('-l<('c])('rs who wish to properly control 

 brood-rearing should do so. One important 

 fact was brought out, that several who had 

 formerly used l^-inch spacing had discarded it 

 for I'i^, "but nai'y a one was there who had test- 

 ed both ways of spacing, and had settled on 13^- 

 incli. Testimony was not wanting, to the ef- 

 fect that more brood could be produced on 1% 

 spacing. Wm. Lyon, of Burlington, la., said 

 that, when bees wish to go into sections, space 

 the combs closer. By so doing, bees are less 

 liable to swarm, and would the sooner put the 

 honey above. He even went so far as to say 

 that thus he almost entirely does away with 

 swarming. Dr. Mason and A. N. Draper had 

 used successfully spacing as close as H^ inches 

 from center to center; but the convention seem- 

 ed to feel that that was going a little bit to the 

 other exti-eme. Mr. L. C. Axtell argued for 1%, 

 but he did not have very good success with 

 closer spacing. He has a mellow soil, and oc- 

 casionally his hives would tip one side and the 

 other. He does not wire the combs, and some- 

 times combs would bulge toward each other by 

 the tipping of the hive, making less than 1^' 

 spacing in places. He noticed that brood-rear- 

 ing was curtailed in said places. He used fixed 

 frames, closed-end Quinby. on l^g spacing, and 

 liked it. B.Taylor had used IK-inch spacing, 

 and had changed to 1%. The latter he had 

 used for 36 years, and saw no reason for chang- 

 ing. 



There was a good deal of bantering in regard 

 to Dr. Miller's expression, "I don't know." The 

 doctor, having been a bee-keeper for many 

 years, has learned that there are a good many 

 other things that he does not know. While we 

 were arguing about what we did and didn't 

 know, our old friend J. W. Bittenbender, of 

 Knoxville, la., arose, and repeated one of Josh 

 Billings' sayings: " What is the use of knowing 

 so much, when so much you know ain't so?" 

 and sat down without comment. Verilv, brevi- 

 ty is the soul of wit, sometimes. 

 f To he contin ued.] 



TEE DOVETAILED HIVE. 



WHAT HENKV ALLEY HAS TO SAY OF IT. 



During the last thirty years, which comprise 

 my experience in bee-keeping, I have given a 

 good deal of study to the bee-hive question. 

 Some twenty years ago I obtained a patent on a 

 hivi'. I believe that that hive was the first dou- 

 ble-wall hive used \\\ this country — certainly 

 th(> first patented double-wall hive. Since that 

 time I liave constructed about a dozen dilTerent 

 styles of hive; but at no time did I lose sight of 

 several important features that, it seems to me, 

 should always be found in all good bee-hives; 

 namely, the Langstroth standard frame, with a 

 wide and thick top-bar. What I call a bee- 

 spac<^ was another important feature always 

 retained in all styles of hives used in the Bay 

 State A[)iary. Not over ^4 inch, and slightly 

 less, is what I consider a proper bee-space be- 

 tween the tops of the brood-fj'ames, or whatiwer 

 is used over them, whether it is a section-case, 

 lioney-board, or what not. When more space 

 is given, brace-combs are found, as well as 

 propolis, etc. 



Early in October I visited a large display of 

 bee-hives at the Rhode Island State Fair. I 

 think there were not far from thirty different 

 styles of hives on exhibition. There was a hive 

 from about every dealer in the country who had 

 ever made or invented a hive. I looked the en- 

 tire lot over, and saw^ but one hive that seemed 

 to combine many good features, and this hive 



