316 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTUKE. 



Aug. 



COMPOSITION OF BROOD COMBS. 



Seeing you have had some difficulty in preventing 

 your fdn. from sagging by means of introducing 

 wires, and thinking of the true composition of honey 

 comb, I drop you a line to suggest the experiment 

 of introducing dry paper pulp, by mixing it with the 

 melted wax before the sheets are formed. If you 

 have not used it, I should like to know what would 

 be the result. True comb has a substance resemb- 

 ling the material of a hornet's or wasp's nest, work- 

 ed in with the wax, which, I think, adds greatly to 

 its strength. Other substances may suggest them- 

 selves to you in practice. Some such process must 

 be resorted to, before fdn. is a perfect success. 



W. D. Hooper, M. D. 



Fancy Farm, near Liberty, Va., June 17, "79. 



I am well aware that brood combs often 

 contain a substance of a papery nature, such 

 as you suggest, and I have long been won- 

 dering if we could not work in some such 

 material as the bees use in capping their 

 brood ; the cappings to drone brood, for in- 

 stance, are more like brown paper than they 

 are like wax, but I have never figured out 

 as yet, how we could make fdn. like it. The 

 trouble is, the little chaps are too fastidious, 

 to be easily suited with any such thing. I 

 have worked paper of every description, in- 

 to the combs; but, sooner or later, some bee 

 takes a notion to investigate, and the nice, 

 beautiful comb is riddled in a short time. 

 While honey is coming in rapidly, they are 

 very well contented with combs having a 

 base of strong paper, but when the honey 

 ceases, they are ready for this kind of mis- 

 chief, thinking, probably, that it looks too 

 nearly like the fabric the moth worni uses 

 for his web. To go back to your point, 

 friend II., bees often build new comb, that 

 is quite largely composed of some fibrous, 

 foreign matter; but, as this is all taken out 

 by the melting process, our fdn. of pure wax 

 always lacks this strengthening material. 

 Who will help work the thing out V 



able to "root" the chaff out of their way, 

 when they wanted to get at fresh stores of 

 honey; would they not? You remember 

 that was the way my first chaff hive was 

 wintered. 



COMB BASKET FOR EXTRACTING BROKEN PIECES. 



I am in receipt of the "comb holder" by mail; the 

 other "holder," for extracting, I will keep, as I 

 found use for it before it had been here 24 hours, in 

 extracting from a broken down comb. 



Cedar Rapids, la., June 28, '79. B. C. Blachley. 



So it seems that mistakes are not always 

 misfortunes. One of the clerks sent the 

 wrong article, and it turned out a very 

 handy thing to have in the (bee) house, after 

 all. 



CHAFF RIGHT ON THE BEES. 



Bees here, as well as every where else, had a hard 

 time of it. They are very few who have not lost 

 half of their stands. I had 7, frame skeps last fall, 

 and I bought 8, box skeps every one of which was 

 heavier than any one of mine. This spring, 1 had 7, 

 frame skeps in good condition, and 3 miserably weak 

 box hives. As I had no chaff cushions or division 

 boards, I placed boards sawed to tit the hive, be- 

 side the frames, and packed chaff between the 

 board and the side of the hive. The mice got in the 

 frame skeps and worked the chaff all through the 

 combs, and I think that is the reason that they came 

 through all right. I caught the mice before they 

 had been in two weeks, by placing a trap in the 

 skep, above the chaff. Henry P. Demarest. 



Warwick, N. Y. 



I have before mentioned having the chaff 

 right in among the bees, covering the bot- 

 tom board, etc., and I can not help thinking 

 that such an arrangement might not only do 

 no harm, but give them the very best possi- 

 ble protection during the extremes of winter 

 weather. A good colony of bees would be 



HOME MADE MATS. 



I send you by mail to-day a mat of my make, for 

 covering bees, and would like to hear what you 

 think of it. I think it will take them quite a long 

 time to eat it up, or even to eat through it, as there 

 is nothing but wood that they can reach if laid the 

 right side up. A. A. Fradenburg. 



Port Washington, O., June 30, '79. 



The mat is much like ours, in appearance, 

 except that the slats are about an inch wide, 

 and are held together by strips of stout cloth. 

 To make them, friend F. has a board made 

 of the proper size, with strips of band iron 

 under the strips of cloth, on which to clinch 

 the tacks. Four strips of cloth are used, and 

 two tacks are put in each crossing of the 

 strips of cloth and wood. At present, I am 

 unable to decide which is handiest, the mat 

 or the sheet of enameled cloth ; each have 

 especial advantages over the other. The 

 enameled cloth is waxed less than the wood, 

 and I believe may be handled more quickly 

 without killing bees. 



WINTERING WITHOUT PROTECTION, STANDS FOR 

 HIVES, ETC. 



When I left off taking Gleanings, 2 years ago, I 

 had one swarm of bees. They increased to 3 that 

 summer; last summer they increased to 10. I win- 

 tered on their summer stands without any protec- 

 tion, only as they protect themselves. They are all 

 alive and doing well now, and have had 4 swarms 

 this spring, which are all doing well. They mostly 

 alight on an apple tree. I have the hive set where I 

 want it. and then I have my wife's clothes basket 

 tied to the garden rake, and going up to where they 

 are, I hit the limb with the rake and hold the basket 

 under to catch them. Then I carry them where I 

 want them, and empty them on a sheet, and it is 

 fun to see the little fellows travel for their new 

 home. I saw blocks off from trees about 10 inches 

 long, and set my hives on them. I think that has a 

 tendency to keep the dampness of the ground from 

 the hives. C. A. H. Fisher. 



( )nawa City, Iowa, June 19, 1879. 



I am well aware that we have, every year, 

 reports of successful wintering without pro- 

 tection, but I was a little surprised to hear 

 my neighbor Dean say, a few days ago, that 

 he believed a colony would winter every 

 time, if left on their summer stands, with 

 the upper story on. full of section boxes. 

 His farming neighbors all around him, who 

 had carelessly left their bees in that way, 

 had wintered them all right. As it was a 

 very hard winter, upward ventilation was 

 unusually necessary, and this they had with- 

 out stint. A few years ago, I discovered, in 

 March, a colony that had been left by mis- 

 take in the same way. They were a rousing 

 colony, and the bees were right up against 

 the bottoms of the broad frames, which they 

 had waxed and gummed up in pretty com- 

 fortable style, considering. "You poor neg- 

 lected things !" said I ; and I went and got 

 chaff cushions and fixed them up in the 

 most approved style, even though they did 

 object most vehemently. Well, they began 

 to dwindle from that time forward, and 

 soon played out entirely. Should I look at 

 this one case alone, I might decide in favor 

 of out door wintering without protection. 



