264 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUEE. 



July 



is no occasion to feed rapidly. This latter 

 plan has been given several times in print 

 already. 



If the bees that frequent your water jar 

 come in large numbers, it may not flow 

 from the jar fast enough, unless the mouth 

 is raised slightly ; this we do by means of a 

 a few bits of window glass. 



IMPROVEMENT ON THE ABOVE. 



The above was written just about four 

 years ago, this present month. I have just 

 been improving on it a little, and below, 

 submit the arrangement as we have it in the 

 apiary now, for watering bees. Get a piece 

 of board about 1 foot square, and with a 

 saw, or saws, such as we use for grooving 

 the ends of the pieces composing the section 

 boxes, plough grooves from one end of the 

 board to the other, being careful that they 

 do not run quite out. Now, with a single 

 saw, cut a groove from each corner to the 

 opposite one, and a couple more across the 

 grain of the wood, near 

 the middle, and the 

 board is done. These 

 grooves should be about 

 i inch deep, and about 

 the same distance^ from 

 each other. Invert the 

 jar of water on the cen- 

 tre of the board, and the 

 grooves will keep just 

 full of water, as long as 

 any remains in the jar, 

 and yet they will never 

 run over. The bees can 

 stand on the walls of 

 wood that separate the 

 grooves, as well as on a I 

 sheet of their own comb, 

 and with as little danger watering jar 

 of getting daubed, or and board, or 

 wetted. Now this ar- open air 

 rangement makes per- feeder. 



haps the best feeder ever invented, for 

 open air feeding (see feeding and feed- 

 ers) ; for all we have to do is to use sweet- 

 ened water, instead of water only. Put a 

 pound of coffee sugar in the jar, fill up with 

 water, cover it with your hand, and shake 

 briskly, and it is ready for business. Lay a 

 paper over the mouth of the jar, as before, 

 invert it on the centre of the board where 

 the grooves cross, draw out the paper, and, 

 if it is at a time when robber bees are 

 hovering about, some one will soon find it. 

 After the first bee has gone home with one 

 load, he will bring others back with him, 



and pretty soon, the board will be covered 

 with them, sipping like a lot of pigs out of a 

 trough. As the syrup goes down in the 

 grooves, air will be allowed to come in, and 

 you can see, by the bubbles rising in the 

 jar, just how fast they are taking the syrup. 



I have just been watching one of these 

 feeders (May 31, 1879), and after the bees 

 got well at work, a bubble would be on its 

 way to the surface in the jar, almost con- 

 stantly, and the liquid was carried off by 

 the little fellows, at the rate of about 1 inch 

 in 10 minutes. This would empty the i gal- 

 lon jar in about an hour and a half. Not a 

 bee is daubed, and they flit away to their 

 hives, as easily as if they had loaded up 

 from the blossoms on the trees. This feed- 

 er answers admirably for feeding grape 

 sugar, for all we have to do is to fill the jar 

 with lumps of it, and pour in water until it 

 is filled, and then invert as described. The 

 passage of the bubbles upward tends to dis- 

 solve the sugar rapidly. Old, thick, or can- 

 died honey may be fed in the same way, and 

 when the bees stop, the feed stops coming 

 down into the grooves. This will perhaps 

 be the best arrangement we can have for 

 feeding grape sugar to keep brood rearing 

 going on, during a season of drouth or 

 scarcity. 



In the above engraving, the jar and board 

 are represented as standing on a block of 

 stone, but they may be placed on a box or 

 block of wood as well. We keep the device 

 a few rods from the apiary, under a clump 

 of trees, to call away the robbers from about 

 the hives. Of course, the arrangement may 

 be placed inside the hives, by putting in a 

 division board, or setting it in an upper 

 story. 



If you wish to give them a supply that will 

 last them a month or more, it may be well to 

 get a large glass bottle or carboy, at the 

 drug store, and your bees will then have- 

 water during the season, all they can 

 use. Where there is a spring near you 

 that can be conducted to the apiary, a very 

 pretty watering place can be made. Be 

 stu - e that it is so arranged that the bees can- 

 not get drowned. A little fountain, where 

 the spring is high enough to allow it, is a 

 very pretty addition to the apiary. I once 

 had one made with an iron vase, perhaps 

 eighteen inches across. This basin was al- 

 ways full, and overflowing slightly, and dur- 

 ing the warm weather all summer long, bees 

 would be sipping the water around the edge; 

 sometimes they stood side by side clear 

 around the edge of the vase, making a sight 



