American Bac Journal 



honey had gathered dampness not at 

 all pleasing to me. But with the stove 

 I was master of the situation, even did 

 "Old Sol" see fit to hide his face be- 

 hind the cold, black clouds for 2 weeks 

 at a time, and the honey was going 

 right on ripening and thickening all 

 the while, even if I delayed getting it 

 ready for market till the shorter days 

 of fall came on with frosty nights. 



By thus having my honey thoroughly 

 ripened till it was so thick that it would 

 hardly "run," when a section dropped 

 so as to be broken on the floor by 

 some carelessness on my part, I found 

 that far less would be damaged in ship- 

 ping, stay much longer in good condi- 

 tion when stored in the warehouse of 

 the merchant, and give far better satis- 

 faction to the consumer. 



Borodino, N. Y. 



Long-Tongue Clover Queens,Etc 



BY G. C. GREINER. 



It is not my intention to flatter any 

 one, but I believe I can truly say that 

 Mr. Byer always presents his subjects 

 in such a common-sense sort of way 

 that his articles are not only interest- 

 ing but instructive at the same time. 

 Although I do not see things always as 

 he does, I agree with him on many 

 points. On page 332 (1909) he says: 



"The long-tongue-idea, in so far as 

 it refers to the different races, is pretty 

 much a humbug." This is exactly my 

 opinion. I always thought so, and I 

 think so yet, and the reason why I have 

 never expressed myself publicly in such 

 a decided way is because I was waiting 

 for some good authority to bear me out 

 in it. 



During a bee-keeping career of about 

 34 years, my banner colonies that pro- 

 duced the heaviest yields of honey have 

 always been blacks or hybrids — never 

 Italians. A year ago last summer I 

 had one Italian queen that did better 

 than anything else I had late in the 

 season, but her aggregate yield was be- 

 low that of many others in the yard. 

 The colony that produced my largest 

 yield last season — about 2()5 pounds of 

 white clover honey, gathered in less 

 than 20 days, and from 45 to 50 pounds 

 of buckwheat honey — were a mixture 

 of one Italian to three blacks — hardly 

 enough Italian blood mixed in to call 

 them hybrids. Where does the long- 

 tongue feature come in, in this case ? 

 Have they retained it as an heirloom 

 from some of their ancestors ? 



On the other hand, I have all regard 

 for the sincere intentions and claims 

 of our long-tongue queen-breeders; 

 their efiforts to benefit mankind are 

 very commendable, but, in my opinion, 

 they are deceived. It is with the long- 

 tongue theory the same as it is with all 

 our imagined successes. At first we 

 feel a little skeptical ourselves, but we 

 keep harping on our pet theories from 

 one year to another until we believe 

 them ourselves, while the world at 

 large is laughing at our foolish notions. 



Bee-Tight Honey-House. 



On the same page, Mr. Byer makes 

 some remarks on the bee-tight honey- 

 house question, and I indorse all he 

 says in its favor. A bee-tight honey- 



house is certainly a bee-keeper's desid- 

 eratum. I can tell Mr. B. that my 

 honey-house is not only bee-tight, but 

 fly and mosquito tight also; and that 

 isn't all, it is as mouse, rat and sc|uirrel 

 proof as it is bee-tight. To read Mr. 

 B.'s squirrel experience is quite amus- 

 ing. I would not advise any of his 

 squirrels to enter my honey-house un- 

 invited ; I would make their visit so 

 decidedly unpleasant that thev would 

 not call a second time. 



When I built my present honey- 

 house, some 8 or 9 years ago, I in- 

 tended to use it as a fumigating box 

 whenever necessity should require it. 

 But during all this time I never had 

 any real occasion for this purpose. I 

 fumigated once— the second year it was 

 built— just to see how it would work in 

 case of need. I noticed a few webs 

 among the combs on the comb-shelves, 

 and for an experiment I set the sulphur 

 smudge a-going. It made such a com- 

 plete job of it that I could not ask for 

 any better arrangement. And in re- 

 gard to mice or rats, I never had the 

 first sign of either. I am so completely 

 set against these vermins that I would 

 leave, if they wouldn't. But I venture 

 to say, that their stay would be ex- 

 tremely short, if any of them would risk 

 their poor carcasses inside of my 

 honey-house. There is no hiding-place 

 anywhere. The whole building— floor, 

 sides and roof— is made of matched 

 and dressed lumber; doors and win- 

 dows and all joints are as close-fitting 

 as mechanical workmanship could 

 make them, so that the building itself 

 is a trap for all undesirable visitors 

 that get inside of it. 



Buckwheat Swarms. 



As a rule, we have no buckwheat 

 honey to speak of in this locality. The 

 conditions Mr. Byer describes in his 

 article on the same page, nearly covers 

 my case. Although he beats me a little 

 on the surplus, I can "go him one bet- 

 ter " on the time of issue. A year ago 

 last summer we had an uncommonly 

 heavy buckwheat flow during the sec- 

 ond half of August, which changed to 

 a continual flow from fall flowers, last- 

 ing until the middle of October. Con- 

 trary to former experiences, I had a 

 regular buckwheat swarm on Aug. 16th, 

 and still another on the 26th. Both 

 swarms were equally as strong as any 

 regular prime swarm in June, espe'- 

 cially the second one, which I hived on 

 a set of empty combs, expecting to 

 supply them with the necessary winter 

 stores by exchanging some of their 

 empty combs for heavy combs of honey. 

 During the few weeks following they 

 grew so heavy that I considered them 

 all right without any extra feeding; 

 and when I requested a bee-keeping 

 friend, who called at the yard later in 

 the seaison, to lift this hive, he was 

 surprised when I told him the date of 

 their issue. They actually seemed, as 

 Dr. Miller says, nailed to the ground. 



But I made tlie mistake not to pro- 

 vide them with a set of extracting 

 combs, for undoubtedly they would 

 have stored some surplus. It is often 

 on account of our own neglect that we 

 are the losers. As we can not foretell 

 the season, it stands us in hand always 

 to be prepared for just such emergen- 

 cies. With the honey-producer, a few 



August, 1910. 



days ahead or behind-time will many 

 times make all the difference between 

 gain or loss. 

 La Salle, N. Y. 



Nosema Apis— A Bee-Parasite 



BY C. P. DADANT. 



This newly discovered parasite of the 

 honey-bee is not yet proven to be the 

 cause of the spring diseases of the 

 bee— dysentery, diarrhea, paralysis or 

 May disease— and I fully agree with the 

 editorial in the American Bee Journal 

 for June, concerning the needlessness 

 of worrying about its discovery. There 

 would rather be cause for rejoicing 

 that another step has been made which 

 may enable us to conquer diseases al- 

 ready existing, but which have thus 

 far been permitted to thrive until they 

 naturally worked themselves out. 



I repeat it, it is not at all proven that 

 Nosema Apis is the cause of bee-diar- 

 rhea, constipation or May disease 

 however probable it may seem. It is 

 true that Dr. Zander has succeded in 

 reproducing the disease by feeding col- 

 onies with honey mixed with excre- 

 ments of diseased bees containing this 

 parasite. But the English scientists 

 had already pointed out what they 

 thought to be the cause of these spring 

 diseases; some of them described a 

 bacillus which they named "bacillus 

 depilis," owing to the hairless appear- 

 ance of the diseased bees. Cheshire 

 also described what he called " bacillus 

 Gaytoni," charged with the same mis- 

 deed. 



In order to be able distinctly to trace 

 a disease to a certain organism, it is 

 first necessary to single this organism 

 out from among the thousands which 

 inhabit every living or dead body, make 

 cultures of it containing no other or- 

 ganism, and then succeed in producing 

 the identical disease with the these cul- 

 tures. Failing in this, or doing what 

 was done by Dr. Zander, you can only 

 surmise concerning the probability o'f 

 this parasite being the true cause, and 

 not a result, of the disease. What hap- 

 pened concerning foul brood is an evi- 

 dence of tlie correctness of this. Dr. 

 White, of the bacteriological Bureau at 

 Washington, has clearly shown that 

 the true bacillus of malignant Ameri- 

 can foul brood could not be cultured 

 on ordinary bouillons, beef broth, etc. 

 but could be reared only on larval food' 

 When by the help of the microscope 

 you investigate the domain of the in- 

 finitely small, you meet thousands of 

 different organisms, animal and vegeta- 

 ble, and in order to find the guilty one 

 you must breed them in turns and test 

 singly their powers for harm, if you 

 wish to be positively sure. 



The Germans themselves long ago 

 thought to have detected the cause of 

 the May disease, and described a micro- 

 organism which they called "mucor 

 mucedo," of which T. W. Cowan gives 

 a description in his "Guide-Book," 

 page 187, and through the action of 

 which these scientists explained the 

 diseased bees' inability to fly. This in- 

 ability is well known, and is one of the 

 reasons for naming the disease " paraly- 

 sis." 



The reader thus sees that there has 

 been no lack of research and informa- 



