672 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Aug. 15 



cells attached to them are convenient in han- 

 dling, and regular Doolittle cell cups may be 

 attached to them instead of imbedding them. 

 I greatly prefer it, any way, and I thus save 

 the price of the press for making the depres- 

 sions. 



On page 507 E. H. Schaeffle says in regard 

 to the difference in the working qualities of 

 different colonies, "It is a well-known fact 

 that some stands will put up several hundred 

 pounds of honey in a season, while others in 

 the same apiary will not give a pound of sur- 

 plus." Really, has such a thing ever hap- 

 pened anywhere? If it did, would it not be 

 jumping at a conclusion to say the reason for 

 this difference is in the greater business integ- 

 rity of stand No. 1 ? In another season stand 

 No. 2 might outstrip stand No. 1. There are 

 often some other conditions we do not under- 

 stand that bring about different results. But 

 now to the fact : According to my experience, 

 no such difference in stock exists. If there is 

 ever a very wide difference in the yields of 

 two colonies, the principal cause lies some- 

 where else, and may have been overlooked. 

 If we search carefully we may be able to find 

 the real cause. I do not mean to say there is 

 no difference in stock, but we need not look 

 for such a wide difference. Progress is always 

 slow. One of the best ways to test different 

 strains of bees as to their honey-gathering 

 quality is to hive new natural swarms of equal 

 strength at the same time into empty hives, 

 and watch results. 



In speaking of straining extracted honey, 

 Mr. Schaeffle says, a little further on, " When 

 the honey is extracted it is run into a wire- 

 cloth strainer that catches all small particles 

 of wax, bees, and grubs ^ For the purpose 

 the wire-cloth strainer is a good thing ; but I 

 am sure the great majority of consumers of 

 honey would object to Mr. S.'s product pro- 

 vided they knew that a lot of grubs had been 

 fished out of it. I myself don't think a bee- 

 larva any thing horrible, yet I don't want it in 

 my food any more than I do flies or fly-blows. 

 Aside from this, if we extract from combs 

 containing open brood, some larval food will 

 find its way into the honey. Even in small 

 quantities it will not serve to make our prod- 

 uct any more appetizing. This extracting 

 from combs with open brood in them should 

 be denounced on all sides, no matter how 

 widely it is practiced. 



[It may be that the confinement of queens 

 is injurious to them. If so, sending them by 

 mail has its bad effects. It was Mr. W. Z. 

 Hutchinson who once showed me his little 

 three-section nuclei, 8 of them in one super, 

 and above the screen of wire cloth, the same 

 thing as is shown in the hands of Herman 

 Rauchfuss in last issue, on page 633. When 

 I called on Mr. Hutchinson he showed me 

 how he was keeping a surplus of queens in 

 these little nuclei over strong colonies — that 

 is to say, he utilized the heat from powerful 

 stocks to take care of eight queens. Each of 

 these queens would lay a very few eggs, and, 

 having a few bees, were confined by means of 

 zinc until such a time as he might have an 



order. While we have never confined queens 

 in this way I should not have supposed that 

 such a practice would have been at all injuri- 

 ous, because a queen can lay a few eggs ; and 

 to give her a little rest for a week or ten days 

 I should suppose would be beneficial rather 

 than othervnse. 



With regard to Mr. Schaeffle's statement 

 concerning one stock that would produce 

 three or four hundred pounds of honey while 

 another one would not produce a single pound 

 of surplus, I suppose he had in mind the dif- 

 ference there is between colonies in the 

 same yard, for there is a difference ; but Mr. 

 Schaeffle has, perhaps, made it much too 

 strong. Some colonies, as we know in our 

 own yard, will gather honey and fill supers 

 while others will be disinclined to go into su- 

 pers, or would store comparatively small 

 amounts of surplus. Mr. Doolittle calls at- 

 tention to the fact that one colony will store 

 30 lbs. more than another ; and if this is so, 

 it is important for us to breed from the strain 

 that has more energy. For instance, the bees 

 of our red-clover breeder keep on storing 

 honey, even after the honey season ; and this 

 thing is true of the bees of the daughters of 

 this queen. But it would hardly be fair to 

 say that this one queen would produce 300 

 lbs. of honey while the mediocre stock would 

 not produce one pound. But I think we do 

 need to pay attention more to strains of bees 

 than we have been doing of late ; and the fact 

 that beedom is now getting wakened is a 

 rather healthy indication. 



About straining extracted honey, I notice 

 that, even when an effort is made to extract 

 only from combs in the extracting-super, 

 there will be occasionally a grub on the wire 

 cloth of the strainer. This I saw in some of 

 the best apiaries in California. The fact is, 

 there will be occasionally little patches of 

 brood unless perforated zinc is used under the 

 super combs. But I believe your point is 

 well taken, that it is a bad practice to extract 

 from brood-combs, especially when those 

 combs constitute all the brood-nest. There 

 may be conditions that warrant it, but as a rule 

 the practice should be condemned. — Ed.] 



SUGAR. 



Tbe Difference between Beet and Cane Sugar; 

 which is Better to Feed Bees? 



BY W. K. MORRISON. 



There seems to be a doubt in the minds of 

 some that cane sugar is better than beet for 

 feeding purposes, though European bee-mas- 

 ters have long since arrived at the conclusion 

 that cane saccharine matter is always superior 

 to beet. Though the bulk of the bee-keepers 

 who use cane sugar could not give a sound 

 scientific reason for the faith that is in them, 

 I do not think that their experience lacks sci- 

 entific proof. 



In the first place, cane sugar is sweeter, 

 just as Jersey milk is richer than Holstein 

 milk ; and for this reason alone it commands 



