1887 



GLEAN 1:NGS lis BEE CULTURE. 



171 



NEW EXPBHIMENTS 



To Determine the Proportion of Honey Used 

 by Bees in the Production of Wax. 



THE PROPORTION OF HONEY CONSUMED TO MAKE 



A POUND OF WAX IS AS SIX OF THE FORMER 



TO ONE OF THE LATTER. 



ITp S the iliscussioii of foundiition or no 

 ^Kj foundation, and economy in the pro- 

 j^l dnction of wax, is now before our 

 ■^^ readers, our friend Dr. Miller has re- 

 ferred us to an article in one of our 

 foreign exchanges, the Bulletin d' Apiculture 

 de la Suisse Bomande, wvitten by that shrewd 

 observer G. de Layeus. Our proof-reader, 

 W. P. Root, translates it as follows : 



In the following- experiments I was not altogether 

 occupied with the idea of ascertaining wliether 

 bees build combs more or less mechanically with 

 this or that Jiiud of sugar; 1 simply tried to keep 

 track of the quantity of honey the bees disposed of 

 in working in the apiary, unrestricted, at a time 

 when they chose to do that work. 



The experiments made up to the present time 

 differ so much one with another, that all methods 

 are deceptive, and this is why it seemed to be in- 

 teresting and profitable to recommence them on a 

 ditferem line of procedure. 



Two questions, which have often been confound- 

 ed in practice, and which should be carefully dis- 

 tinguished, present tliemselves at the outset. 



First, when the honey-How is heavy it is never ad- 

 vantageous to let the bees make wax, even when it 

 costs but little to produce that wax; for, on the one 

 hand, if one gives to the bees a few frames to 

 build out, among a great number already built 

 out, in order that, in building them, they may lind 

 sufficient room in the finished combs to store all the 

 honey they gather, they will nearly always build 

 drone combs. On the other hand, if one gives them 

 frames only, to bring them to the condition of 

 swarming, they will then build a large number of 

 worker-cells; but not being able to place in these 

 new frames for storage all the honey they gather, 

 the prosecution of the work in wax will not go hand 

 in hand with the harvest. 



We see, then, that at the time of a heavy flow it is 

 alwai s preferable not to allow any work on wax to 

 be done; but when, on the contrary, the flow is fee- 

 ble, is it more or less advantageous to allow bees to 

 work on wax? That is the sole question I shall try 

 to answer. 



The processes of experimenting, which, up to the 

 present time, appear to be the best, are, in short, to 

 choose two co'ouies, A and B, of equal size, of which 

 the one. A, contains frames to be filled, and the oth- 

 er, B, the finished combs. After a certain time, the 

 honey gathered by B is weighed, then that by A, 

 then the quantity of wax produced; the difierence 

 between the weight of honey, compared with that 

 of the wax produced, gives the proportion of the 

 honey to the wax. 



This method is subject to various errors. 



1. When the queens are of exactly the same fe- 

 cundity they do not lay, in the same number of 

 days, exactly the same quantity of eggs, because, 

 in one of the hives, there is, after the first day, all 

 the room necessary to lay— room which does not 

 exist in a colony that builds little by little. Then 

 at the end of the experiments there will be more 

 brood in the one than in the other, as the one uses 

 ditferent honey from the other — a difierence which 

 has not been taken into consideration. 



2. It is generally believed, that if one selects, 

 from an apiary, two colonies of the same strength, 

 and of the same apparent activity, he can, without 

 great error, compare the work of the two colonies; 

 but it is often quite otherwise, as I am about to 

 prove. 



Having visited two colonies, Nos. 1 and 2, of 

 which No. 1 was about twice as strong as No. 2, 1 in- 

 creased the two colonies to the swarming condition. 

 The bees thus becoming free to gather the crop ac- 

 cording to their respective size, as they had no 

 more brood in their hives, I weighed accurately the 

 honey gathered by each of them at the close of a 

 good day for honey. No. 1 had gathered 2 kilo- 

 grams 140 grams* while No. 2 had gathered 2 k. 030— 



*A kiluvriam may be reckoned as a little more than 2 ll)s. 

 5 oz. A tliousaud grams make a kilogram. 



that is to say, nearly as much, while it should have 

 gathered at least a half less. 



This year Mr. Bertrand proved to the contrary 

 these same results. One colony gathered '61 k., 

 while another, of about the same lorce, gathered, in 

 about the same time, 18 k. The question here is 

 not to explain these facts, but to prove that all ex- 

 periments which depend upon a simple comparison 

 of the work of two colonies of the same force, can 

 inspire no confidence. Here are the circumstances 

 under which I made my experiments: 



1. The colonies worked freely in the apiary in the 

 ordinary way, in order not to change the normal 

 condition of their work. 



2. The experiments were made at a time of year 

 when the temperature was high— the highest at least 

 20 degrees Centigrade (70 Fahr.)— a temperature at 

 which bees show a preference for a free state in 

 order to make wax. 



3. I selected, for my experiments, a time when 

 the honey-flow was poor, in order to be sure that 

 those colonies which built, as well as those that did 

 not build, could find sullicient room in the combs to 

 store all the honey they gathered. 



4. I selected from the apiary two colonies of bees 

 dittering in the number of worker bees and brood, 

 but which seemed, apparently, to work with the 

 same energy. These two colonies, which I will des- 

 ignate by A for the stronger and B the weaker, 

 were the only two which were brought up to the 

 swarming condition. 



A received T finished combs; then I inserted 

 among these combs some frames for them to fill out. 

 In this way I was sure to compel the bees to finish 

 the combs, and that room should never be lacking 

 for stores in the finished combs, in order that the 

 queen might not be hindered in the least in her 

 laying. 



B received eight finished frames, so that the bees 

 could not make wax in the wrong place. 



5. I made two experiments in succession, each 

 one lasting exactly eight days. At the end of the 

 eighth day all the frames were taken away from the 

 hives and replaced by others, but in a contrary 

 way; that is, B then built combs, and A was kept 

 from building. This method of increase was very 

 important, for it permitted one, in working with 

 any two colonies whatever, to obtain comparable 

 results, summing up at the end of the experiments 

 ail their mutual diflerences. 



6. At the end of these experiments, the honey 

 gathered by A and B was added (these colonies 

 made wax); at last the wax produced by the two 

 colonies was added; but on account of great damp- 

 ness the honey gathered during the IB days of ex- 

 perimenting contained much water, so that at the 

 end of the two periods none of the cells were yet 

 sealed. The very thin liquid honey contained more 

 water than sealed honey; and in order to eliminate 

 this source of error I ascertained the density of 

 the sealed honey and that ol the honey which had 

 been gathered. Alterward, in adding a sulficieut 

 quantity of water to the sealed honey, so as to give 

 it the same density as that which was not sealed, 1 

 could easily find the quantity of water which the 

 thin liquid honey contained in excess, which had 

 been gathered, and subtracted this quantity of wa- 

 ter fiom my calculations. 



To sum up, the difierence of honey gathered by 

 the colonies which built cells, and those which did 

 not build, indicated the weight of honey used to 

 make a certain amount of wax. 



7. During the iti da.\ s of experimenting, the 

 queens laid unequally, as they were of unequal fe- 

 cundity; but it might have been that, during this 

 period, the egg-laying did not go on constantly In 

 the same proportion of inequality. That was, in 

 ettect, what took place. In the hives which did not 

 build, the queens laid I(i,0ti4 eggs; in the hives 

 which did build, the queens laid lb,tj3f eggs. This 

 slight difierence in brood represents the consump- 

 tion of honey, of which the weight should be added 

 to that gathered by the colonies which built; but as 

 the eggs did not hatch till the close of three days, 

 and as it was only at this moment that tliey com- 

 menced to use feed, only 358 larvti^ were fed, whose 

 consumption of honey it is necessary to determine. 

 According to the experiments of Berlepsch, the 

 consumption of honey and pollen sluiuld have been 

 47 grams, to furnish sutlicient feed till the y.5(< larva* 

 should hatch out. According to other experiments 

 which I made on this subject, 1 found that the bees 

 used, to feed the larva', nearly as much honey as 

 pollen, of which 25 grams of honey was the maximum 



