^2-1 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Dec. 



robbers are bad, Ihey pitch into these empty 

 combs with a vim.' as you perhaps know. 

 Another thing, it costs quite a little honey 

 to make bees gorge themselves during a 

 dearth. I once had a colony with stores 

 enough for winter— at least, so I thought. 

 They were cross hybrids, and I smoked them 

 several different times to make them gorge 

 themselves with honey. This induced them 

 to lengthen out the cells, and build out 

 combs in some places, as you mention. But 

 before I got the queen introduced they had 

 lost at least a half of their winter stores. It 

 had been converted into wax, instead of be- 

 ing put back into the cells. Notwithstand- 

 ing these objections, I think your plan an 

 excellent one many times. The idea that 

 they commence working like a new swarm, 

 is doubtless true, although I have never no- 

 ticed it. The loss of queens in introducing, 

 of late years, is much less than formerly. 

 In our own apiary, we do not: lose one in 25, 

 even where we put them in rapidly. In in- 

 troducing 70 imported queens this fall by 

 use of the Peet cage, not one was lost, and 

 they are considered the most difficult to in- 

 troduce of any queens we get hold of. after 

 their long sea- voyage. 



J. H. MARTIN'S DEVICE FOR SELLING 

 EXTRACTED HONEY. 



CAN WE SELL OUR EXTHACTEU HONEY FOR ONE 

 CENT PER OUNCE, AT AVHOLESAI^E? 



HAVE fallen into the habit of raising extracted 

 bbney, and it seems that I am not letting- my 

 bees work to good advantage if I run for box 

 honey. Then the swarming, just as they get 

 settled down to business! away goes your 

 swarm, leaving boxes about half full of honey. 

 There is more or less a check every time a swarm 

 comes off. We have run 160 swarms for extracted 

 honey, and every swarm was doing its level best. 

 We had but six swarms from the 160. A ladj-, whose 

 husband kept bees, visited our apiary and said she 

 was glad to get where she could see some honey. 

 At their house it was swarm, s\varm, swarm, and 

 no honey. 



When I get my tons of extracted honey, I am 

 then conscious of the fact that I have an article 

 that is not staple. Buyers don't offer you cash for 

 it; if they handle it at all it is on commission, and 

 this j'ear your share would be about what the com- 

 mission and freightage would be. The great prob- 

 lem, then, has been with me to get my honey upon 

 the market so as to get some money out of it. It is 

 very evident, that if we could convert all of our 

 honey into confectionery, the entire honey crop 

 would not supply the demand. Now, in the absence 

 of a method to convert it into [confectionery, the 

 next best thing is a small honej'-package. D. A. 

 Jones, of Canada, has given us his little tin boxes; 

 but their appearance is so much like a pill-box, that 

 they don't seem to take on this side of the line. My 

 experiments for a small novel package have re- 

 sulted in the invention of what 1 term the " Can- 

 teen honey-package." The novelty consists in the 

 fact that the honey from it can be eaten from the 

 hand, like an apple or orange. It is very attractive; 

 and by turning a little crank upon one side, the 

 honey is forced out of the orifice, where it can be 

 bitten off. Candied honey alone is used in this 



package. We have tried to educate people in rela- 

 tion to the purity of candied honey; but there is so 

 much adulteration in every thing we eat, it is of 

 but little use to reason with them. Is not a small 

 package a good method to teach the rising genera- 

 tion the value of pure honey? Those are the 

 thoughts that have actuated us in preparing this 

 package. We hope it will be a benefit to bee-keep- 

 ers at large. Honey put up in these i)ackages real- 

 izes the bee-keeper 16 cts. per lb. Will it pay to put 

 up honey in such small packages? This question 

 can be answered onli' by a trial in each bee-keeper's 

 locality from our own experience. We have so 

 much confidence in it that we hope to have several 

 thousand upon the market during the holidays. 



Now, Mr. Editor, if I have ground my ax too 

 much in this article, you may just notice my can- 

 teen, and refer the friends to my advertisment in 

 this issue. John H. Martin. 



Hartford, N. Y. 



Friend M., I should almost have known 

 that the machine was of your get-up, even if 

 I hadn't seen your name at the end of the 

 letter, for it is just like you. i will explain 

 to our readers, that the package looks like a 

 common tin blacking-box. ^V crank on one 

 side makes it look somewhat like a toy mu- 

 sic-box the children have about the holiday 

 time. You just take out the cork and turn 

 the crank, and the nice basswood honey 

 oozes out in a square stick, ready to be bit- 

 ten off. The quality of the honey is excel- 

 lent ; and the only drawback I see in regard 

 to the enterprise is, that it seems to me the 

 machine will cost too much to be afforded 

 so it can be retailed at a dime. Retailers 

 would want to purchase them at §7.00 per 

 100, filled with honey. Four ounces of hon- 

 ey would be worth, say, 4 cents, and there 

 would be 3 cts. each for "making the machine 

 and tilling it with honey. Perhaps I should 

 add, that a strip of colored paper is attached 

 in the form of a bail, so as to make the pack- 

 et look like a canteen, such as the soldiers 

 use. If any one objects that this is some- 

 thing like free advertising, I would reply 

 that friend M. will never get rich out of it 

 at the prices he offers it. 



UPPER ABSORBENTS. 



A COVERING OF LOOSE CHAFF 5IORE DESIRABLE. 



MR. HEDDON utters a sentence on page 696. 

 Oct. 15, that strikes me, and one to which 

 I expected the editor to take strong ob- 

 jections. It is this: "I am becoming of the 

 opinion that our upper absorbents are 

 usually useless, and ofttimes worse." It strikes 

 me, because I have arrived at the opposite con- 

 clusion. It seems to me that all natural phenomena 

 involved would argue in their favor. But what has 

 most conduced to convince me is actual experience 

 in wintering. I winter on summer stands, in sum- 

 mer hives. I put chaff' division-boards in the sides, 

 and chaff cushions on top. This protection on two 

 sides and on top, though far from peifect, perhaps, 

 works quite well. It confines the bees to a small 

 compass, and furnishes a non-conductor of heat, 

 and absorbent above — the direction in which heat 

 and moisture both tend most to go. Usually the 

 top cushions have been only about lYs inches thick, 



