58 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



-J A N . 



considerable vinegar from waste honey, to which 

 we added some fruit juices, as currants, grapes, 

 etc. In making jelly I put cold water upon the 

 pulp left after squeezing out what juice I want for 

 the jelly; and after straining it, put it into the 

 vinegar-barrel, together with the skimmings from 

 the jelly. This gives a beautiful color and flavor 

 to the vinegar, which can not be surpassed for 

 table use; but I And that, while I can make very 

 nice sweet fruit-pickles by using the usual amount 

 of sugar, I can uot make good vegetable pickles, 

 even by the use of sugar. The pickles are delicious 

 when first made, but soon the vinegar turns white, 

 and, if neglected, a heavy coat of mold will be 

 found on the top. 1 have never experienced this 

 difficulty when cider vinegar was used, and I de- 

 sire to know whether others have found the same 

 difference between vinegar made from honey and 

 that made from cider. Emily E. West. 



^lint, Mich., Dec. 14, 1888. 



My good friend, we have had considerable 

 experience in the use of different kinds of 

 vinegar for pickles. Yes, sad experience. 

 Now, while cider vinegar will perhaps keep 

 pickles longer than vinegar made of honey, 

 or water sweetened with the residue from 

 making maple sugar, etc., our experience is, 

 that no kind of vinegar, except a high qual- 

 ity of white-wine vinegar, is suitable for 

 keeping pickles any length of time. Cider 

 vinegar does very well where the pickles are 

 used up before warm weather comes in the 

 spring; and very strong cider vinegar may 

 keep them through the summer ; but with 

 white-wine vinegar, that costs something 

 like 80 cts. a gallon, we can keep pickles 

 year after year. Perhaps cider vinegar may 

 be so treated and so concentrated as to keep 

 pickles safely through several months of 

 summer weather. It may be, also, that 

 honey vinegar that is very strong and sharp 

 might answer. 



.JAPANESE BUCKWHEAT NOT AS GOOD A YIELDER 

 OF HONEY. 



Japanese buckwheat yields three times as much 

 as the silverhull, and it is two weeks earlier; but 

 the bees do not work on it so well as they might if 

 they had nothing else. I do not want to raise it for 

 the bees. 



WH1TEWOOD FOR HIVES. 



I think that whitewood makes the best hive and 

 the best frames. The bees like whitewood the best 

 of any kind. 



My bees have done well this summer. They have 

 made 1700 lbs. of honey. Thomas Oberhitner. 



Deshler. O.. Dec. 3. 1888. 



i Ai. IM. SURPLUS QUEENS DURING WINTER, OVER 

 STRONG COLONIES. 



Can 1 get a book on bee culture, from which I can 

 learn how to save queens sure, during the winter 

 months? I mean queens for which I have no use 

 in the fall. II so, have the kindness to give the 

 name "I the book and the price. .1. Glanzmann. 



Utus, Ark. 



We might refer you to our A I! •' of 

 Bee ( iulture ; but neither that nor any other 

 book that we know of would yive you any 

 sure method by which you could preserve 

 queens alive when separated from the clus- 

 ter, either by caging or otherwise. We have 

 caged queens over a strong colony of bees 



where there was already a reigning queen, 

 perhaps one or two months during the win- 

 ter. We never had any yet that survived 

 until they could be made use of in the 

 spring. A month or six weeks is as long as 

 we could keep them after confining them in 

 the manner explained. 



HONEY FROM APPLE-TREES ; 54 LBS. IN SEVEN 

 DAYS, BY ONE COLONY. 



Mr. Doolittle, in his review of your A B C book, 

 says that apple is a great yielder of honey, and my 

 experience during the past season has convinced 

 me that he is right. I joined your ABC class of 

 bee-keepers in May, 1887. 1 then bought three 

 colonies of bees for $18.50. I increased them to 6, 

 and got 330 lbs. of comb honey. 1 wintered them 

 without loss, by packing in chaff, 10 to 12 inches on 

 each side of the hive, and about 18 on top. I open- 

 ed them April 1st, and found that brood-rearing 

 was well under way, but I thought they had too 

 much honey (about 30 lbs. per colony), so 1 extract- 

 ed the outside frames and placed them in the cen- 

 ter of the brood-uest. I then covered them very 

 warm, and fed the honey back to them slowly. 

 They increased very rapidly, and I think those 

 hives contained as many bees May loth as they 

 have at any time since. I had one colony which 

 stored 54 lbs. of apple honey in seven days; anoth- 

 er one filled 24 sections in four days, and then 

 swarmed and made a good start in their new hive 

 before apple - bloom was gone. I did not have a 

 colony which stored less than 10 lbs. of apple honey 

 in the sections. Sections of empty comb, when 

 filled with apple honey, were sealed almost as soon 

 as filled; and I doubt if even you could distinguish 

 them from newly built combs. There was but lit- 

 tle clover, and they worked only three days on 

 basswood. I got 300 lbs. of comb honey, and in- 

 creased my 6 colonies to 17. When September 

 came my colonies were light, and the brood-nests 

 were nearly empty. I fed them 300 lbs. of sugar, 

 so I did not make very much; but I am not at all 

 discouraged. I have gone into the business to stay, 

 and I shall stay whether I succeed or not. 



If you can read this, you will do well. I wrote 

 it while lying in bed with a broken leg. 



Gilead, Mich. D. E. Weage. 



Friend W.. I have long been aware that 

 apple-trees often produce enormous quanti- 

 ties of honey. There are several obstacles 

 in the way, however, of getting such a yield 

 as you mention. One is, the bees are sel- 

 dom strong enough to take advantage of it. 

 Quite a few times, when we happened to 

 have powerful colonies during apple-bloom, 

 we have had quite good yields. I feel sure, 

 however, we can, if we choose, have at 

 least a few rousing colonies during apple- 

 bloom. The other trouble is, and perhaps 

 the worst of all, that the weather is often- 

 times very unfavorable for gathering honey 

 from apple. In fact, 1 have known bad 

 weather almost through the entire apple- 

 bloom period. Then there are seasons 

 when apple-trees do not blossom very much. 

 and also when a profuse bloom gives little 

 or no honey. I think it is well, however, to 

 prepare ourselves as well as we can, espe- 

 cially when we are in a locality where apple- 

 trees are plentiful. If we could find a spot 

 protected by taH forest-trees, or, better 



