1885 



GLEANINGS IN 13EE CULTURE. 



6-59 



the willow lor the honey, and not to the maple. If any 

 person has maple, with no willow within five miles 

 of him, the conclusion that the honey came from 

 maple would be better founded than when there 

 was an abundance of both, and still the conclusion 

 mig-ht be wrong-, as the proof by killing- a bee might 

 show. When I desire to know just what a bee is 

 getting fi-om any plant or tree, I watch it for some 

 leng-th of time till it has visited a number of flowers, 

 when I catch and kill it, after which I remove its 

 honey-sack, which tells me at once if said bee is 

 getting honey from the flower it is at work upon; 

 for if the sack is empty it says no honey. Thus I 

 find the honey-sack of bees at work on hard-maple 

 blossoms empty, while their pollen-baskets are fill- 

 ed with pollen; a bee thus caught on the gold- 

 en willow shows a sack full of honey, with no pollen 

 in its baskets. Is not this better proof than the 

 first supposition cited? These facts arc of value 

 when we are deciding what to plant for honey. But, 

 to return to the i-eport. 



Bees got scarcely a living from rasiibeny : but. 

 thanks to our farmers, a few acres of alsike clover 

 had been sown the season previous, which, together 

 with the little white clover along the roadside, gave 

 the bees a plenty for brood-rearing, while some of 

 the strongest stored a little in the sections from the 

 same. However, but very few sections were com- 

 pleted— the main benefit being in helping in 

 tirood-rearing and giving a start in some of the sec- 

 tions, which was continued during the basswood 

 How. 



Ba.sswood opened July 14th, but the bees got very 

 little from it until the 18th, at which time work bc» 

 gan in earnest, and lasted for 12 days, wliich, with 

 1 wo days of winding up, ended the honey season for 

 188,'); for since this the bees have got nothing ex- 

 cept a little for brood-rearing fluringalew warm 

 days about the 10th of August. 



After having my honey all crated and weighc-d, I 

 find the result of the season to be as fr)llows- Coml) 

 honey, r-ni;:.' lbs.; extracted, 188 lbs.. or:iUK» pounds in 

 all. This divided by 27, the iiumlier of colonies 

 worked for honey, gi\'es an avarage of 117 lbs. per 

 colony, nearly all of which was coml) honey. 1 

 have at date, itO colonies ami :>0 nuclei, l)ut I siiall 

 double down to less than l(K) for wintei-. I am sell- 

 ing a little honey about hoine at 1.') cts. for comb 

 and 10 cts. for e.vtracted, but 1 presume I shall send 

 the most of it to be sold on commission, as those 

 talking about buying oflfer Aery low prices. F. I. 

 Sage & Son, of Weathersfleld, Conn., have Iwnight 

 several crops in this lOnondaga^ and Cortland 

 Counties, at from 11 to 13 cents per lb., but I am 

 hardly willing to sell at those figures. One thing 

 recommends their plan of buying to bee-keepers, 

 however, which is that they come to your i-ailroad 

 station, accept and weigh the honey there, and pay 

 "spot " cash for it. Thus the bee-keeper is relieved 

 of all worry and bother which naturally arises 

 where honey is shipped on commission, or paid for 

 on delivery in any of the large cities. 

 Borodino, N. Y., Sept. 16, 188.5. O. M. Doulittle. 



Friend D., the point yon make is a good 

 one, tliat we are not sure that bees get lion- 

 ey from any plant or tree, simply because 

 we see them busily at work on it. and lioney 

 is coming into the hives. It still seems to 

 me, however, that bees do get mucii honey 

 from tUe maples here, although I have no 

 better reason to give, thaj) that maple-trees 



are roaring with bees, while an abundance 

 of honey is coming in, having a strong llavor 

 of maple syrup. There are very few willows 

 in our vicinity, and I have never noticed 

 bees on them, what there are, unless it be 

 an occasional willow, such as we sometimes 

 find in dooryards. as an ornamental plant. 

 However. Iain going to test the matter.inthe 

 way you suggest, when I see bees^working 

 on the maples again.— I am glad to know 

 that there arc large honey-buyers who make 

 a practice of going right to the producers, 

 and shipping it at their own expense. 



EIPE EXTRACTED HONEY. 



HEDOON S PLAN TO GET IT. 



'Wc, S promised, I will now endeavor to outline the 

 ^^ik P'"" ''■^' which I produce such honey as 

 1^ brings a favorable testimonial from about 

 ■*^^ f) of my customers (most of whom are bee- 

 keepers, and good judges of honey), and 

 complaints from none; such honey as I hare just 

 shipped you. 



Before beginning a description of my plain sim- 

 ple method of working, let me first call your atten- 

 tion to the fact, that although our basswood honey 

 stands first in brightness of color, and second to 

 none in the comb, it is beginning to be graded as 

 second to white clf)ver, when extracted, by some of 

 our dealers and consumers. The (juery naturally 

 arises, " Whj- this ditlerence in grading, between 

 these two kinds of honey in the comb, and extract- 

 ed?" I believe the reason to be based upon the 

 fact, that many of us have extracted our honey be- 

 fore it was ilrdd ripe; and where this system is 

 practiced, basswood honey is apt to be taken out in 

 the least rii)e condition, for the reason that clover 

 honey is usually riper in the flowers, and comes in 

 slower, allowing the bees to evaporate it more, be- 

 fori' the apiarist thinks he sees the necessity for 

 (•m)ityiiig his coml s. 



I suppose nearl.\- all read«'rs know w-hal is meant 

 by " ripe" honey. We call honey "ripe" when it 

 lias that smooth, oily, and thick consistency of old 

 comb honey that has been in llie hive some consid- 

 erable time. It is then free from that sharp 

 " twang," or cutting sensation in the throat, which 

 nearly all consumers dislike. This undoubtedly is 

 caused by a slight development of bacteria, which 

 are always jiresent, we arc told, in cases of fermen- 

 tation. It may properly be said, that this raw, 

 "twangy" honey, is more or less infested with 

 these germs, or tending toward fermeutatiou, or 

 souring. The interior of the hive, together with 

 the system of digesting, heating, and ventilating,, 

 bj' the bees, seems to be the best place yet known 

 in which to destroy these germs, leaving the honey 

 thick, rich, oily, or smooth : in other words, ripe. 



I will tell you how we have worked to produce 

 our honey, which we consider thoroughly ripe. 



Our last winters loss of about 350 colonies left us 

 with a large number of combs to cover with bees. 

 We had on hand and nailed up, about 600 supers the 

 full size of our 8 L. frame hive. When our hives 

 were well filled with brood, and the surplus season 

 opened, we put on our honey-board ,Jand one of 

 these supers containing eight brood-combs. As 

 soon as these eight combs were pretty well filled, 

 and the becg cojpmenccd capping tfiem at the top, 



