1887 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



897 



If he gets crazy on strawberries, and con- 

 tinues to like the business, he will doubtless 

 succeed with it ; and he may eventually 

 drop the bees, and attend to strawberries 

 altogether, especially as the one is apt to 

 conflict somewhat with the other, in har- 

 vesting the crop. 1 presiune that circum- 

 stances have mucli to do in one's taking a 

 fancy to any business. If liis own town is 

 poorly supplied with strawberries, and he 

 discovers that he is eminently fitted for 

 raising them, it would not be strange if 

 these things should help to make it attrac- 

 tive, for there are few things so encourag- 

 ing as a good piice for the product, that 

 covers cost, and (juite a little more, — In re- 

 gard to a race of non-swarming bees, we 

 would go about it in tliis way, or something 

 like it : If you have a colony in your apiary 

 that has never swaimed, tiven when enor- 

 mously strong and storing comb honey, this 

 is tiie colony to raise queens from. Among 

 the young " queens thus raised, you will 

 probably have one or more queens whose 

 workers, like the parent hive, produce 

 large crops of comb honey, without any at- 

 tempt at swarming. Select the best, with 

 this feature in view, and raise (jueens from 

 that stock, and I feel pretty sure we shall 

 pretty soon have non-swarming bees just 

 like our non-sitting breeds of poultry ; and 

 we shall have to perpetuate them by raising 

 (jueens just as we perpetuate our non-sit- 

 ting fowls, by having other breeds hatch 

 their esjgs. 



THAT COLONY IN A SIX-STORY HIVE. 



DR. MILLER GIVES US SOMK INTERESTING DETAII,S. 



fOU express awisb, on page 768, to know, friend 

 Root, how the colony wintered that had been 

 in the six-story hive. I am sorry to say I 

 can not tell. There were two colonies in 

 much the same condition, one of which died, 

 but I am not sure which one. The dead colony had 

 plenty of empty combs, so they did not die because 

 crowded on combs full of honey. Indeed, if I am 

 not mistaken the lower story of the six had, all the 

 while, plenty of empty combs, so the bees did not 

 spread through the u])per stories for lack of empty 

 combs in the lower story, but apparenllj- because 

 they desired to fill first the empty cells of the upper 

 story, and then successivel.y to fill all the other 

 stories before occupying the first. If this case 

 points to the belief that full combs are not the best 

 for bees to cluster on, here is something that points 

 the other way. This fall my bees were destitute of 

 stores, and were fed with sugar syrup, the feeding 

 being done after the brood was all, or nearly all, 

 hatched out. (I have always supposed that such 

 late feeding was bad, but that is not to the point 

 here.) Lifting the quilt after a colony had been fed 

 30 lbs., I found the combs looking empty— that is, 

 the cells in sight were empty; and lifting out the 

 combs, the stores seemed to be in the cluster, and 

 the empty cells outside. I noticed no case in which 

 the bees filled the outside cells, leaving a vacant 

 center. Does this mean that it is best lor the bees 

 to have their stores for winter in the cluster? 



You ask as to the quality of the honey in the six- 

 story colony. I am not sure that I can tell you 

 about that particular case, for the combs of honey 



were given to the bees; but I never knew honey 

 left a long time in care of a strong colony to be oth- 

 er than good. A more distinctly marked case I can, 

 however, tell you about. In the summer of 188ti a 

 small colony was in a ten-frame hive, the colony 

 having, I think, four frames closed in by a division- 

 board, the remaining part of the hive being empty. 

 Being left to itself, this colony increased in strength 

 unexpectedly; and when looked at. the bees had 

 made good progress in filling with combs (pretty 

 crooked, of course) the empty part of the hive. 

 (Now, IJro. Hoot, I know you will say 1 ought to 

 keep fewer eolonids, and take better care of them, 

 and I am beginning to feel a little that way myself.) 

 The whole attair was left untouched; the hive, hea- 

 vy with honey, was put in the cellar, taken in the 

 spring to the Belden apiary, and not till some time 

 in late May or June was the colony taken from this 

 hive, and the hive with its crooked co«il>s of honey 

 brought home. Thinking it would do to feed in the 

 fall, it was left standing in the house till some time 

 in September, and then upon cutting it out it was 

 found very thick, clear, not candied, and of exqui- 

 site flavor, unsurpassed by any thing I had ever 

 tasted. Part of it was white and part buckwheat, 

 and the buckwheat seemed improved the most, quite 

 unlike any buckwheat 1 had ever tasted. Here was 

 honey left in charge of the bees nearly a year, and 

 wintered over in the cellar. Might not a cellar be 

 so managed as to successfully winter section 

 honeyV 



NUMBER Ol'' CELLS TO THE SQUARE INCH. 



It is common to speak of comb as containing 25 

 worker-cells to the square inch, and 16 drone-cells. 

 Ought we to speak so loosely? My attention was 

 first called to it in Frank Cheshire's book, where he 

 gives 381^i as the number of worker-cells to the 

 square inch, and 18',?" drone-cells. If the cells were 

 square, 35 and 16 would be correct; but they are 

 hexagons. 



DIAGRAM TO SHOW EXACTLY THE ^UMHI■:l( <'f 

 WORKKR-CELLS PER SQUARE INCH. 



Any one curious in the matter can easily solve it 

 by algebra, or even by arithmetic. In the figure of 

 a hexagon here given, having the diameter n /j we 

 have 6 equal equilateral triangles. Bisecting one 

 of them gives us the right-angled triangle a c d, 

 with the hypothenuse <■ d. If a d is 1, r d is 3, and 

 (I c is found by taking the square root of the differ- 

 ence of the squares of a d and c d. The squares of 

 (( d and c d are 1 and -t, their difference 3. The square 

 root of 8 is l.;3205. the measure of a c. But in a 

 worker-cell the diameter is \ of an inch; and half 

 the diameter, or the linear, .lof an inch. To reduce 

 a d to the same scale, we find by proportion that 

 1.73305 is to .1 as 1 is to .057735, the true measure of 

 a d in a worker-cell. To get the contents of the 

 triangle c d c, multiply half the base, or .057735, into 

 the altitude a c, .1, and we have .00577a5. There are 



