I'H)! 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



791 



NATIONAL BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION. 



Object:— To [iromotc an.l iirotpct the interests of its mem 

 hers; to i>rcvfur tlio ailul.ciMi ion of lioiifV. 



Officers :-)■; }{. KcM>t. I'l-.'sideiii. M. ilina. 0.; R. 0. Aikin 

 Vice-presiilent, Lovoland, Col.; Dr. A. B. Mason, Secre- 

 tary, 351-' Monroe St. Sta. B, Toledo, O.; Eugene Secor. 

 General Manaaer, Forest City, Iowa. 



Board OF Directors:— E. Whitcomb, Friend, Neb.; W. Z 

 Hutchinson, Flint, Mich.; A. I. Root, Medina, O.; E. T. 

 Abbott. St. Joseph, Mo.; P. H. Elwood, Starkville, N. Y.; 

 E. R. Root, Medina, O.; T. G.Newman, San Francisco, 

 Cal.; G. M. Doolittle, Borodino. N. Y.; W. F. Marks. Cha- 

 pinville. N. Y.: J. M. Hambaueh, Escondido, Cal.; C. P. 

 Dadant, Hamilton, 111.; C. C. Miller, Marengo, III. 



Fees:— Annual membership fee, Cl.tKl. Remittances may be 

 sent here or to General Manager as above. 



Our subscription-list is larger than ever 

 before in our history, and it is still grow- 

 ing" at a rapid rate. The increase for 

 months and months is the greatest we have 

 ever known it. We desire to thank our 

 friends for this liberal patronage. We are 

 figuring on some pleasant surprises, and 

 hope to present them a little later on. 



The reader's attention is called to the 

 fact that we are now using a brand-new 

 face of type. We have for some months 

 back been trying to decide between a type- 

 setting machine or continviing the use of 

 hand type in the good old-fashioned waj'. 

 After considerable investigation we have 

 concluded that, for our purpose, hand type 

 was the best adapted for our purpose. 



During the Buffalo convention several of 

 us made our headquarters at the home of 

 Mr. Orel L. Hershiser, 301 Huntington Av. 

 He is located within 20 minutes' walk of 

 the Pan-American, and within one block of 

 a street-car line. His terms are $1.00 per 

 day for lodging and breakfast ; and any 

 bee-keepers who yet expect to go to the big 

 exposition will do well to put up with Mr. 

 Hershiser, for he has a nice place. 



I AM satisfied that, within ten or twenty 

 5'ears, the larger amount of honey will be 

 produced west of the Mississippi. The ad- 

 vance of intensive agriculture will make 

 bee-keeping less and less profitable in the 

 East, and narrow it down to small apia- 

 ries. In the great West there is much of 

 the countrj^ that can never be cultivated, 

 but which will always yield plenty of hon- 

 ey from the natural growth of tree and 

 plant indigenous to those localities. Then 

 the irrigated regions are so rapidly increas- 

 ing in area that bees can follow in the 

 wake without in the least interfering with 

 the agricultural interests. 



0\\^NG to the fact that we have ju.st 

 changed the dress of Gleaning.s we find it 

 impossible to give a report or hai'dly a brief 

 mention, in this issue, of the Buffalo con- 

 vention, and of the joint meeting of the 



American Bee-keepers' As.sociation with the 

 American Pomological Society. But I will 

 sa}' this: That both meetings were exceed- 

 ingly enjoyable and profitable. At the joint 

 session the fruit-men showed a decidedly 

 liberal spirit toward the bee-men — so much 

 so that it looks as if we do not need to ar- 

 gue the question any further, whether bees 

 are necessar}' to the proper setting of many 

 kinds of fruit. But, more anon. 



WAX IN ORDINARY SLUMGUM. 



Herbert Freas sends from St. Anns, 

 Ontiirio, some samples of wax and also 

 some slumgum. Of the latter he says that 

 one man sent him 20 pounds which liad 

 been squeezed with an ordinary hand press. 

 From this with a screw press he extrticted 

 7 pounds 2 ounces of fairly well-colored 

 wax. His residue resembled plug tobacco, 

 and hiid about the same odor, onh^ not so 

 much so, as one smoker put it. 



This is only one out of many instances 

 showing how much good wax has been 

 thrown away as so much dross from the 

 old processes of rendering. A good press 

 intelligently u.sed may earn its weight in 

 g-old. 



A MYSTERY EXPLAINED. 



It will be remembered that, some little 

 time ago, I reported that the bloom of the 

 black-locust tree in Central California 

 seemed to intoxicate or l-cill the bees, when 

 the same bloom in Colorado would have no 

 effect. After some little investigation it 

 begins to appear that the dead and dying 

 bees under the California black locust are 

 due to the attack of the oriole, and not to 

 the nectar in the blossoms. Mr. F. E. 

 Brown writes me that this bird grabs tlie 

 bee while it is partly covered with the pet- 

 als of the locust blossoms, and then with a 

 quick movement extracts the honey and 

 drops the poor victim to crawl or squirm 

 about on the ground. This clears up the 

 mystery that was hard to explain, even on 

 the basis of locality. 



DISTINGUISHED VISITORS AT MEDINA. 



We have with us Mr. F. W. L. Sladen, 

 of Ripple Court, England. He is one of 

 the brightest and most intelligent bee-keep- 

 ers in the British Isles. He is especially 

 progressive, loeking for that which is new 

 and useful, and has made a trip to this 

 country in order to study conditions of bee- 

 keeping as they here exist. I expect to 

 make further mention of his visit later. In 

 the mean time I bespeak for him a most 

 royal welcome from the American apiarists 

 whom he may be able to visit in the brief 

 time he may be here. 



We have also had a visit from Mr. Udo 

 Toepperwein, of San Antonio, Texas, and 

 from Mr. G. F. Davidson, of Fairview, Tex- 

 as. Both of these men attended the Buffalo 

 convention, having been sent by their local 

 State society as delegates to the big meet- 

 ing. A little later on we had the pleasure 



